ONLINE PROGRAM

Exhibition Preview: Around a Table

Vesela Sretenovic, PhD, director, contemporary art initiatives and academic affairs, Phillips Collection

Historically, food has been a reoccurring subject in art. Depiction of foods, whether through the genre of still life or domestic scenes, reflects both the organic world and the process of socialization. Food captures the habitats and living conditions of different geographic areas, the customs and traditions of different cultures, reveals global social conventions and forms of hospitality across the globe, and opens up a space of curiosity and belonging. Food crosses the boundaries and brings people together.

Contemporary artists continue to engage food as a theme in their works, often to address conditions of daily life but also make commentaries, social, political and economic through a myriad of media, from painting and sculpture to photography, video, performance, and film. The goal of Around the Table is threefold: to strive to spark conversations across the board, and explore complexities of sensorial, social, and political signification of food as a metaphor for human experience, social gathering, and communication; to seek commonalities rather than differences among people; and to celebrate cultural diversity and coming together “around the table,” in the climate of extreme social and ideological polarization.

$15 fee for guests and subscribers (no fee for members)