Food and Art: the beginnings of an exploration through Plato.

A journey down the rabbit hole of food, art, and ancient greek philosophy

Food and Art, the two concepts have had an unstable relationship as far back as philosophers began discussing Art. The importance of the historical and cultural effect food has had on nations, has meant that it has remained inexorably connected to the psyche of great thinkers from every school of thought. As far back the Ancient Sumerian tale of Gilgamesh (Foster, 2001), throughout history bringing us to modern discussions on micro gastronomy and the modernist cuisine movements of Massimo Bottura and his kin, food has had an undeniable place of importance in our lives. It is with this in mind, that I found myself shocked at reading Plato’s short and direct rejection of food as Art, in firstly the Gorgias (Plato, 1987) and, secondly, The Phaedo (Plato, 1963). Given the nature of ancient Greek society and the exquisite descriptions given of feasts by many writers from the period, Plato who when writing the symposium gives us a vision of a stunning Bacchic style feast, seems to barely bat an eyelid when proclaiming cuisine to be some kind of sensory trickery. The only option was to look towards Plato’s views on Art in hopes of finding something that could remedy this tragic state of affairs. It is through this I found that in fact Plato’s description of Art fits perfectly with the nuances of cuisine and can be utilized to elevate cuisine to a place among the most respected Art forms. In this article, I will attempt to take you through my journey to discovering this, and hopefully set up a further set of questions on which we can later build a new way of looking at food.

The core of my journey relies on the idea that despite his rejection of food as Art, Plato’s exploration of Art (In the Phaedrus (Plato, 1952)) eludes to certain key categories needing to be fulfilled. These categories are as follows: frenzy, healing, ritual and the rhythmic cycle, and embodying Eros. What I find in my own exploration of cuisine, and what I must argue as being clear to most rational people, is that cuisine not only fulfills these categories but also exceeds them. This clear fulfillment of food as art is incoherent with Plato’s clear rejection of cuisine in his other texts. Through my comparison of each category to certain categories of Cuisine, we shall discover new post-categories that show the Arts and food as a symbiote.

In order to explore food as art I will use the example of a specific dish to show the ways it can fulfill each category. The results of the exploration will however be easily extrapolated to all cuisine. For our purposes, a carbonara is an ideal illustration. This is primarily because of the overtly mythological nature of Italian recipes, as well as the decadence of many dishes being exhibited well on this plate. So, to begin with our first category: frenzy. The Divine frenzy is perhaps the most obvious category to give us a comparison to food. Within cuisine the frenzy of consumption is a recurring theme, if we use our carbonara as an example we see frenzy within just the ingredients themselves. The key components of aged cheese and aged, cured guanciale are a clear example of frenzy. The human body can be sustained with a bland and simple diet. The need for decadent, excessive flavours does not spring from our desire to sustain ourselves. We as humans, pursue constantly increasingly rich and complex flavours, with no empirical goal aside from pleasure and further flavour. This form of experience for the sake of experience is exactly akin to the divine frenzy Socrates alludes to when he is read the words of the poet by the river Ilisos.

This argument for food as frenzy through the idea of excess leads us nicely to the core of our argument on the connection between cuisine, ritual, and technique. In Greek culture (often referenced by Plato) the idea of ritual as the way to reach divine frenzy is as certain as the gods. We see this, quite appropriately, in the Bacchic feasts echoed (ironically for Plato) in the symposium. To show how cuisine is just as imbued with ritual as religious or Art ceremony, the carbonara is again a perfect illustration. The carbonara is one of the many Italian mother recipes and, is a controversial figure in Italian cuisine. As a mother recipe the techniques used in the creation of this dish have scarcely changed for generations. The source of the recipe itself is lost in time, yet it still persists with the same ritualistic method repeated across the world. This is all in spite of the fact that food science has produced many alternative (often cheaper and easier) methods. If one was to question the idea that recipes being followed in this way can be comparative to ritualistic technique, I would direct them to the example of Massimo Bottura. (Chefs Table: Massimo Bottura, 2019)

Massimo Bottura is an Italian chef who, when opening his first restaurant in Italy, set out with the goal of challenging the norms of the mother recipes and fighting against this age-old set of rituals. He wished to produce food that was Avant-Garde yet paid a simple homage to the recipes of his childhood. It is in the initial reaction to his food we can understand the religious style depth of the ritual technique of cuisine. Put simply the nation was outraged by his restaurant. There were countless reviews slating his food, national broadsheet newspapers published headlines about his disgrace, and, on a few occasions, members of the Italian public and culinary industry alike, attempted to sue him. Food that “cannibalised” the mother recipes was received with nothing less than the response Socrates receives when being questioned on his piety. However, over a long period of time his Avant-Garde approach was accepted, and he is now a symbol of national pride having been awarded the coveted three-star Michelin.

This example of Massimo is just one of many where we can see the techniques and ritual behind dishes exist within the same realm of mythology in the human consciousness and, are therefore treated with great reverence and passion. These recipes exist partially in the ingredients but most crucially, in the techniques and ritual passed down by generations of families in the same way mythology or religious tales are. These as ritual leading to divine frenzy has further confirmation in the ingredients however. As previously mentioned, the use of decadent and excessive ingredients has a direct link to frenzy, however, the link is also supported vicariously through the rituals used to acquire these ingredients. In our example, to age cheese in the correct way for a carbonara and, to produce and age the Guanciale, an extensive and difficult process is followed. The making of these ingredients is itself filled with its own rituals and, these again have no necessary purpose beyond one: The increase of flavour and experience. This following of these techniques to gain nothing but greater and greater flavour, and then, in turn, to add them to another technique designed to produce even greater experience, is in itself a form of frenzy.

To bring us back to Plato, excess for Plato is so clearly an important component of Divine frenzy, it is, therefore, a necessary component for art. Most cuisine, especially cuisine that has the mythological nature of the mother recipes has a component of excess. It is therefore clear that food can lead us like art, to divine frenzy, and therefore must be considered an art within itself.

To move onto our next category of art according to Plato, and its connection with food, we must look at healing. For Plato, art and healing are necessarily connected. When looking at this category, I want to explore the idea that when it comes to healing, food is actually more effective than most other forms of art. This is because unlike other arts, which unquestionably heals the psyche (and possibly the body vicariously), food has a unique ability to heal both the psyche and the body, directly. To start with its bodily healing. It is empirically the case that the consumption of food sustains us, and, as well as sustaining us it also gives our body the energy it needs to combat disease, build new cells, and repair damaged tissue. Food is the fuel that directly drives bodily healing.

Discussing food's effects on the psyche, however, is a more difficult argument. Although I believe it is clear that it does have a direct healing effect, we cannot generally prove anything empirically when it comes to the psyche. This being the case, the best way to show that food can heal the psyche is to use examples that we as humans have all experienced and are undeniably an example of the healing of the psyche. Food has the unique ability to affect our memory and make us relive the experiences of our past. It does this uniquely by encapsulating every one of our senses. We have all smelled a smell that has given us a sudden wave of nostalgia or heard a piece of music that reminds us of a happier time. With food the smell, taste, tactile feel and, even the sound of it being made, all has the ability to bring us into the world of our past. This ability food has, to reach every sense and pull our minds back into a place of other emotion, is unique and can be incredibly effective at giving us a moment of psychological healing and stillness, and in taking us back somewhere emotionally good.

The final category that Art fulfills according to Plato, is embodying Eros. Regarding food, I would like to draw attention to Socrates' learning of love. The ladder that Diotima teaches Socrates in his route to knowledge on love is something reflected throughout philosophy and religion, it is also clearly reflected in the individual human journey in our exploration of cuisine. The ladder discusses us moving through our development from a place of immaturity to maturity. This maturity is reached by an ever more complex step of love. When we are young, we have very simple and obvious love, we move through slightly more complex stages until, finally, we move onto loving for the sake of love itself.

Here in the evolving complexities, we find our comparison to cuisine. Just like love we begin as young children with very simple tastes. As we grow older, we explore new tastes and experience new flavours, and we learn what we like and dislike. We eventually reach a point (we would say this person has a “mature palette”) wherein we appreciate a broader range of flavours and unquestionably, the nuances and complexities of said tastes. At this stage we are eating and tasting for the love of experience itself. Love and food in this way have a very closely linked way of developing within us. In love, the ladder also extends beyond this point to the divine. Food has a place here also. As mentioned previously with our discussion on frenzy we as humans seem to be constantly seeking a higher form of experience when it comes to cuisine. This is what feeds into my argument for its divine frenzy type nature, however, this constant searching must be driven by something. It seems clear to me that, like when divine frenzy in the other arts is used to try to attain an experience higher in the ladder, this search for a new experience in food is an echo of this. It seems ever clearer then, that there must be this higher plain of culinary experience just waiting to be discovered by us, that if lucky we reach in certain moments of pure ecstasy of flavour.

My conclusions on my own journey in the ladder of discovery have led me to a place where it is clear Plato cannot stand by his own attack on cuisine. In fact, we see more so than most, Plato has given us sets of categories that can allow us a much broader spectrum of what art is. For each category there is so much more to explore, and there are so many details which lead to further exploration of Food and Art. It is undeniable that food has a place amongst the arts according to Plato, but what does it mean for food from this point forward? The culinary tradition has often led innovative chefs to have to fight for their craft. Our hope as individuals who understand Food as Art is that thought such as this should be put into action. With an increase of philosophical exploration of food through these fundamentals of Plato, I wish to verify and support the work of great chefs in their attempts at bringing us closer to divine frenzy. Just as any artist that attempts the new, the struggle chefs in this position have to get their creations verified needs to be alleviated. Only then can we hope to gain the ability to fully explore this great art.

-Sam Chapman

References

Chefs Table: Massimo Bottura. 2019. [Film] Directed by David Gelb. Italy/America: Netflix.

Foster, R. B., 2001. The Epic Of Gilgamesh. Critical edition ed. New York: Norton.

Plato, 1952. Phaedrus. Cambridge: Cambridge university press.

Plato, 1963. Phaedo. In: B. Jowette, ed. The Collected Dialouges of Plato. Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 64D-66A.

Plato, 1987. Gorgias. In: J. D. Zeyl, ed. Gorgias. Indianapolis: Hackett, pp. 460D/E-462D.

Sweeney, W. K., 2018. The aesthics of food. 1st ed. London: Rowman&Littlefield.