Welcome

Welcome to the Serve & Project art project! We are so glad you will be participating in the workshop with us and the blog. We wanted to take a moment to introduce ourselves and invite you to send us an email with a brief introduction and a picture so you we can get to know you a little before we officially meet on June 8th. If you have a website or something with a photo and a little bit about yourself you can send that as well. The bio/introductions will all be kept in email, not posted publicly.

About us:

Io Palmer
Hello, I am currently professor of art at Washington State University in Pullman, WA. I create work in a variety of media including ceramics, fabric and sound. I started my teaching career at Manchester Craftsmen's Guild where I taught ceramics. I have always been interested in food and how artists can use food to make art projects. Thank you all for participating in this project.

Lisa Link

Hi, I am a web designer for the University of Massachusetts Boston where my favorite thing at work is organizing the YouTube channel for the University and watching videos. I started out as a dance photographer because I love to go out dancing and also traditional black and white photography ( a long time ago I even taught photo in the lab at Manchester Craftsmen's Guild). Most of my artwork now is graphic design - photoshop collages and video shorts about political topics. I live in Boston, Massachusetts.

Collage of Yummy Foods - Shayla Dyer

Nancy's Binge

After knowing what i was eating, i feel like a fatty with no need for stopping, but i had fun taking the pictures though, it made me realize that one i love food to much to stop, two i need to stop, and three i dont really want to stop

>w< plz comment

And if your curious im in the mayhem that i call my picture, and so is my sister

Devaughn's food

Project #2 : Audio Record a Friend or Family Member

Audio record a friend or family member
With the audio recorders, designate one family member or friend that you can interview about the foods eaten during the week.
Some questions to get students started:
What is your favorite food? What do you like about it?
What is your least favorite food that you see other people eat?
Do any foods remind you of people or places?
Do you know where the food you eat comes from? Have you ever read the labels ?
What types of foods do they eat.
At what times during the day do you do most of your eating?
How, if ever, have your eating patterns changed from when you were younger? What are some of your cravings you feel guilty about eating?

Things to pay attention to include asking questions that will lead the interviewee to think and consider things in different ways.

Presentation of Audio Work
Using audio software, edit and finish your interviews. Things to consider include the final length of file, seamless editing and accurate representations of the original interview.

Examples:

“Cooking with Clara” on Youtube:

Storycorps, gathering user-generated personal histories:

Voices from the Days of Slavery

Recipes or food as part of history, check out the THE HAWAI'I NISEI STORY_Americans of Japanese Ancestry During WWII

Materials:
Audio recorders, usb cables, editing software like Audacity or Garage Band, blank cd's and memory sticks.

Baking Italian Bread in the dutch oven

I made bread this weekend from a great book called "Baking Bread - Old and New Traditions" by Beth Hensperger. I made the Italian Country Bread which uses a sponge (a wet batter that has a long rising time before you mix it with your dough- sort of like a short sourdough). The sponge is: 1t yeast, 1/3 cup water, 2/3 cup milk, 1t maple syrup and about 2c all purpose flour. I whisked it and let it rise overnight - about 12 hours. In the morning I added: 1t yeast, 2c water, 1T salt and about 5.5c of flour to make the dough. I kneaded it, let it rise for 4 hours, punched it down and transferred it to my dutch oven, and let it rise 2 more hours (slashing a decorative pattern in the top towards the end). In the meantime I made a nice hot fire outside, then knocked it over and put the dutch oven on top of the hot coals. I built up the fire again off to the side and continued adding fresh coals underneath and on top of the oven for about an hour. I got it a bit hot towards the end and burnt the bottom a bit, but other than that it was fantastic.

Project #1: Visually Record Your Food

Photograph all the foods and drink you have consumed during one or two days. Use Photoshop to create a collage of your findings. Be aware of the types of foods and advertising for foods that you encounter and see if, at the end of the documentation process, you are more conscious of the foods that you eat. You can include pictures taken with a cellphone or other devices in your collages in addition to ones taken with a camera.

Think about what kind of documentary/artistic style you will use for your project. Check out some examples below and feel free to add more. As soon as we receive your email, we can add you as an author to the blog.

Artistic Strategies for documenting your food.
Camera Angle – low, aerial (stand on a chair…), eye level
Distance between you (photographer) and the subject (the food) - far away, macro shot
Style – staged like in “nutrition 101” or “Edward Weston’s vegetables” or more free flowing documentary like in Supersize Me (I know, that’s a movie…..just the style)

Presentation of a Series:
Combine your images in one or more collages using Photoshop OR
Print out individual images as a series – arrange as a grid, linear sequence, other pattern.

Examples:
http://www.blueearth.org/projects/current.cfm?projectID=26
NUTRITION 101
Peter Menzel and Faith D'AlusioPeter Menzel and Faith D'Alusio

Edward Weston Natural Studies – the famous pepper black & whites:
http://www.edward-weston.com/edward_weston_natural.htm

Humorous/social commentary as in Supersize Me
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0390521/


Materials:
cameras, computer, photo paper
Please post on SandP meets MCG blog as you develop your work!