Food Hazards
Public Art Review, 2012
As an artistic medium, food holds a particular set of challenges. Whether artists are cooking for museum-goers or cultivating for communities, the perishable nature of their materials demands the savvy of professional food purveyors and the strategy of urban planners. Artists Carol Goodden and Gordon Matta-Clark learned this firsthand after opening the legendary (but short-lived) restaurant Food in 1971. One year later, the artists printed in Avalanche magazine an advertisement of “Fiscal Facts” that quantified their successes and struggles. Over 100 dead roaches, 99 cut fingers, five floods, three city citations, one “ruined” truck, and a total income equal to their expenditures were among the less savory details. However exaggerated this list might have been, their experience is confirmed by artists working with food in the public sphere.