100 Days of Drawings
WHAT i EAT- Food porn in the social media
“What I Eat” is a series of one hundred drawings of food that I ate and posted daily on Instagram in order to share with random people from all over the world. My project is an exploration of the popular trend of “food porn” in our culture---beautiful images of food people post on various social media outlets. I wondered how this trend started, and why it has become such a large part of what we share.
This topic interests me because the answers to these questions are complex. These food images reveal not just what we eat from day to day, but also communicate where we are, our social class, our taste, what gives us pleasure, and what we think gives others pleasure. Images of food now flood contemporary visual culture in many ways; through magazines, shows on cooking channels, images and videos of people eating and cooking on Youtube, writing on blogs and as daily documentation on social media outlets, such as Facebook and Instagram. Even the New York Times now has a food section on their website to showcase delicious looking food. Food itself can be a celebrity and also create celebrities. The appeal of food is obvious--it’s our sustenance--but why did we start caring so much about the way our food, and that of others, looks?
The term “ food porn” was first used by feminist writer Rosalind Cowards in her book “Female Desire” published in 1984. In 2005, Flickr, the photo-sharing website, launched the “Food Porn” category. When Instagram arrived in 2010, people could post photos as they were eating instantly. Since then, the aesthetic qualities of the food photos have become more and more important, revealing that these images are not just merely showing what we eat, but are viewed as reflections and extensions of ourselves. Megan Garber, a food journalist, states that we would come to treat food no just as a source of substance, but as a source of beauty that warrants intellectual engagement (Food: The Newest Celebrity from The Atlantic, April 15, 2015). Some researchers have shown that when it comes to appetite, food porn may serve as a substitute for food itself.
Since the advent of the internet in the 21st century, communication between people has shifted drastically. When South Korea went through an uprising to fight for their democracy from 1980 through early 1990, printed materials were used as a tool to spread news between the people because the mainstream media was controlled by the government. During the 2010 uprising in Egypt, revolutionaries used online social networks to communicate with each other and the outside world. These examples show that once printed materials were a revolutionary form of communication, but now social media has taken over this role.
My project uses both forms of communication because my drawings are “hard copies”, gouache, pen and watercolor drawings on paper, but they are mainly seen and distributed via digital media. Traditional printmaking is unnecessary because I can share images of my work instantly and simultaneously on Instagram with people all over the world. This is a technologically advanced way of disseminating images, yet it is conceptually linked to traditional ways of printing multiple images. I don't know at least half of my followers who like my drawings, but we regularly communicate with each other through my images of food. The technology has allowed me to reach not just other artists, but people who are interested in the food itself---a whole other demographic. It is a new way to spread images and ideas and to communicate beyond the gallery walls!
You can go to http://www.iphoneogram.com/u/22541989 to see my drawings online or follow EunkangkohART on Instagram.
All drawings are done in gouache, watercolor and pen
This topic interests me because the answers to these questions are complex. These food images reveal not just what we eat from day to day, but also communicate where we are, our social class, our taste, what gives us pleasure, and what we think gives others pleasure. Images of food now flood contemporary visual culture in many ways; through magazines, shows on cooking channels, images and videos of people eating and cooking on Youtube, writing on blogs and as daily documentation on social media outlets, such as Facebook and Instagram. Even the New York Times now has a food section on their website to showcase delicious looking food. Food itself can be a celebrity and also create celebrities. The appeal of food is obvious--it’s our sustenance--but why did we start caring so much about the way our food, and that of others, looks?
The term “ food porn” was first used by feminist writer Rosalind Cowards in her book “Female Desire” published in 1984. In 2005, Flickr, the photo-sharing website, launched the “Food Porn” category. When Instagram arrived in 2010, people could post photos as they were eating instantly. Since then, the aesthetic qualities of the food photos have become more and more important, revealing that these images are not just merely showing what we eat, but are viewed as reflections and extensions of ourselves. Megan Garber, a food journalist, states that we would come to treat food no just as a source of substance, but as a source of beauty that warrants intellectual engagement (Food: The Newest Celebrity from The Atlantic, April 15, 2015). Some researchers have shown that when it comes to appetite, food porn may serve as a substitute for food itself.
Since the advent of the internet in the 21st century, communication between people has shifted drastically. When South Korea went through an uprising to fight for their democracy from 1980 through early 1990, printed materials were used as a tool to spread news between the people because the mainstream media was controlled by the government. During the 2010 uprising in Egypt, revolutionaries used online social networks to communicate with each other and the outside world. These examples show that once printed materials were a revolutionary form of communication, but now social media has taken over this role.
My project uses both forms of communication because my drawings are “hard copies”, gouache, pen and watercolor drawings on paper, but they are mainly seen and distributed via digital media. Traditional printmaking is unnecessary because I can share images of my work instantly and simultaneously on Instagram with people all over the world. This is a technologically advanced way of disseminating images, yet it is conceptually linked to traditional ways of printing multiple images. I don't know at least half of my followers who like my drawings, but we regularly communicate with each other through my images of food. The technology has allowed me to reach not just other artists, but people who are interested in the food itself---a whole other demographic. It is a new way to spread images and ideas and to communicate beyond the gallery walls!
You can go to http://www.iphoneogram.com/u/22541989 to see my drawings online or follow EunkangkohART on Instagram.
All drawings are done in gouache, watercolor and pen