Saturday May 24, 2014

For the Pit's first private art event, artists Emily Marchand and Sasha Bergstrom-Katz have collaborated on a 5 course dinner that was served in the empty gallery space prior to our inaugural exhibition. The meal was served on handmade ceramics crafted by Bergstrom-Katz and was conceptualized and executed by Marchand.  The collaboration meets in the middle where the dinnerware serves the functions needed by the menu and the food acts as part of the ceramic sculptures. 

In The Raw and the Cooked, Claude Levi Strauss analyzes dichotomies found among common experiences of primal actions and utilitarian objects, most notably the relationships between societal members and food.  He claims that profound abstract notions can be and are realized through opposite dichotomies related to food such as fresh vs. rotten, and raw vs. cooked and put forth into propositions that structure social norms (i.e.: what is rotten in a human being’s character was realized through interacting with the qualities of rotten food). 

Bergstrom-Katz and Marchand site the science fiction films of Cronenberg as an influence on their event as well as the food fight scene from the 1991 film Hook.  Both influences share Strauss’ interest in the social act of eating and how the experience is shaped or shifted based on interacting with specific objects, people, and food items. The meal straddles the line between unusual and appetizing; playing with color, form and texture and by considering the historical vocabulary of ceramics such as glazing, firing, and texturing.

To commemorate the event, the artists have collaborated on an edition of table settings. Each edition includes two handmade ceramics by Bergstrom-Katz and a set of two handmade, hand dyed napkins by Marchand. Check them out in our shop!