Our Call for the Show in Amherst, MA this Spring

Serve and Project ( S&P), an interdisciplinary collaborative public arts project seeks dinner napkins from creative thinkers around the world. 



Artists from around the world are invited to submit a napkin or series of napkins that creatively documents a meal. While food references sustenance it also represents social and political issues. We are seeking people to submit cloth or paper napkins that in some way represent your connection to food and culture. Napkins can be drawn on, embroidered on, folder, torn or otherwise made.


Sizes: Napkins can be any traditional or non-traditional shape as long as it fits within a 10” x 10” (25.4cm x 25.4cm) area and fit within a standard paper envelope for shipping. Pieces must be able to hang on the wall with a small pin. 


Free: We provide envelopes for return mailing. 


Deadline: Work must arrive at Io's office by February 28, 2011

attn: Prof. Io Palmer

Fine Arts - Office 5072,

PO Box 647450,

Washington State University,

Pullman WA 99164-7450,



Display of work: As part of Trans Cultural Exchange, Here There and Everywhere, International Conference taking place in April, 2011 in Boston, Mass. USA, this work will be exhibited at the Hampden Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA. Napkins are part of a larger project titled Cyber Feast. 



For further information on Serve&Project please visit: 
Website: http://serveandproject.com/pages/gallery_serve.html



Created by Io Palmer and Lisa Link, Serve & Project is a public art initiative that explores the cultural, political, and economic issues surrounding the production and consumption of food.

Frozen Food

Dennis Oppenheim sculpture "Black" outside our cafeteria. Photo by my co-worker, Peter Tattlebaum. It has been snowing a lot in Boston....

Coincidentally, my other co-worker, Martha Scanlon also photographed "Black" and shared it with me - like how her phone made it like it was an underwater tea-party.

Digging the Change

I have never been so dirty on the New Year.

In honor of the birth of 2011, one of my closest friends and I embarked on a major project - redesigning my existing garden. The goal is to use my space more effectively so that I can grow more food, use less water, and preserve soil. My target for the year is grow at least 50% of my family's vegetables. 

To be honest, however its not just about us. In our time of food insecurity and increased financial hardship, I hope to encourage others to champion creativity, community effort, and self reliance. This little plot of earth can be a place for creativity and collaboration. In CyberFeast, we've seen how food can bring people together with a creative end. Can you imagine the change and creative power that can come from a living, evolving, and sustaining environment?

I'm digging that change.

Thank you for this invite. I am excited about Cyber Feast and sent off my napkin Friday. The Omnivore's Dilema is so inspiring. Gave me hope. Currently I am using illegal seed..Oh MY!!!!! Makes me feel daring. Our garden supplies us with so much that we need not question. My daughter has horses, do I need to say more, and I still recall how to hand pick potato bugs as I did in childhood.
I am returning to my quilling now. Getting ready for a wearable show next year. Building a dress.

Happy New Year 2011

Wishing everyone a great start to 2011! We started with pure sugar & lots of fries! As far as food goes, broke any kind of healthy New Year's resolution so it made it more fun to re-do the resolution today. This year want to pay more attention to locally grown food and try to get to the urban farmer's markets when they are in season. The Omnivore's Dilemma is a source of inspiration - super book if you have a chance. Grateful to be able to celebrate with friends and family and hope your year is one where dreams come true!

Lisa Link, Boston, MA

And I bust them all the time...

After the carousel, the slides and swings, tree-house conspiracies, a picnic, ice cream and Pixi Stix, a full day and full bellies, Emma performed this paean to la dolce vita...http://billfisher.dreamhost.com/bustmybuttons.htm

Penn says...

"I just finished reading this book..."

Dia De Los Muertos Individuales

Wonderful project by Maya Escobar ( who participated in Cyberfeast I )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWnIppzPhak

Dear Chocolate, Thank You - An interactive food experience

Just recently I was invited by the Sophia Institute in Charelston, SC to participate in an exhibition of women artists. I was excited by the opportunity because I really wanted to do an interactive exhibition piece that explores our emotional connection to food. Dear Chocolate, Thank you is a collaborative work that documents and discusses our individual and collective connection to this sweet treat.

Exhibition goers were invited to take a chocolate bar throughout the run of the exhibition. In exchange takers were asked to write thank you letters to chocolate. The letters were written on labels I designed, and then left behind. There are some incredible responses!

Jonell Pulliam

Welcome Hui Ling Lee

Welcome to our newest participant, the artist Hui Ling Lee. Visit her website,

http://www.huilinglee.com/home.html

and blog:

http://huilinglee.blogspot.com/

Såbor y Memoriå

"The deepest, most distant memories can be triggered by an aroma, an instant reminder of home. From appetizer through dessert, Sabor y Memoria combines and contrasts Latin musical genres old and new in much the same way that flavors are blended in the cuisine of a new land. "

http://www.solycanto.com/sabor.html

I heard them interviewed on NPR the other day. They play great music!

It spoke to what Io and I were exploring in the visual arts with Serve & Project last year in Pittsburgh, inviting teenagers to interview older people in the community about the intersection of food/culture/memories. It is something we are looking to continue with this blog.

Is there someone, an older person, you would like to interview about their memories of food/recipe stories/family dynamics/culture?

domesticated

Richard Wrangham’s book "Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human," and (Wired mag's) Kevin Kelly's ideas discuss how we, as humans, “physically changed ourselves through agriculture, through cooking…we’re both masters of technology and also the children of technology.” The first domesticated animal, us, was self-domesticated through breakthroughs in the technology of cooking, controlling fire, the curing process and so on. Changes to our bodies, our teeth, our social structures, mating habits, everything that set the stage for me sitting in front of this laptop with an organic Poptart knock-off in a small town in central Georgia, drinking an African bean coffee and adjusting my Philippines' sweatshop Levis (coffee, PopSmarts and jeans bought from an international retail chain store) and considering the meaning, purpose and implications of unmanned drone bomb drops, Tom Tancredo, Cristine O'Donnell, Sharon Angle, F. Goya, Raymond Pettibon and http://classes.bnf.fr/dossiecr//atelier/grand/sq03-12.htm

The Last Piece of Cake in the Office Kitchen

It looked so lonely, in the little kitchen area of the office. Those last pieces of cake always linger. People come in and out, alone, behind closed doors with the last slice, do they dare eat it? Will they leave the empty pan?

Does anyone else document food in their workplace? If so, I would love to see some photos! Thank you to Peter Tattlebaum in the neighboring cubicle for photographing the cake!

Lisa, October, 2010

The biggest benefit of working on a project like Serve & Project is meeting interesting people from all over the world. Last week Lisa and I Skyped with Erik Benjamin, the Cyber Feaster who interpreted the dessert delight Hamantaschen. Lisa and I were impressed not only with what Erik brought to the Cyber Feast project but his compelling and thoughtful creative work. Visit Erik's website here.

Food for Thought and Brilliant !

So interested in this piece by artist Raul Ortega Ayala, Living Remains.
Check out these brilliant works shown at the Stroom Den Haag ; the Hague.