“Cured” investigates our practice of preserving food. Preserving food to prevent spoilage has a long history born from necessity, found in all cultures. Negative stigma is ascribed to preserved foods in our modern day foodview, despite remaining the most accessible, affordable, and reliable option. Capitalism, globalisation, and the romanticisation of rural life has glorified the luxury of fresh, organic, and ‘exotic’ foods. The paradoxical idea of manipulating nature to preserve it reflects our human desire to control the world around us.
“Manicured” explores the dichotomy of nature versus human, questioning the barrier between the inside and outside, domesticated and untamed, pristine and contaminated. Our consumerist society uses nature as aesthetic inspiration in all sorts of designs. Whether it is the pattern of zebra fur for textiles or the figure of a pig for a coin container, we have managed to profit from nature by selling it as packaged and digestible ornaments for our manicured world. We tame and commodify nature to appeal to consumer tastes, picking the pleasing qualities to mimic by disregarding the polluted and uncontrollable Other.
As the metabolic rift widens between the consumers and producers of our society, the kitchen remains one place we must deal with our appetite hands-on. Cured & Manicured is a reiteration of the typical kitchen, divided into three parts. My work uses found objects, sculpture, and illustration to examine the tension between human and non-human worlds. Unusual objects and kitsch pastel colours serve to combat the fatigue, guilt, and defeat many feel about environmental concerns, in hopes of motivating a more open and optimistic approach to mediating an issue so intimidating and large.
Open the shelves - I encourage you to look inside and see what you may find.
