Louise Fresco on TED

Louise Fresco – Feeding the whole world

2009 Feb.TED – ted.com
18 minute talk

“Louise Fresco shows us why we should celebrate mass-produced, supermarket-style white bread. She says environmentally sound mass production will feed the world, yet leave a role for small bakeries and traditional methods”- ted.com

She’s talk was very unilateral, and she missed a lot of details, and that’s why there are a lot of interesting comments.

Here are some good comments:

“Stop buying mass produced bread that somehow have 15-20 ingredients instead of: flour, yeast, water ,salt and whatever niceness you feel like putting in it.” – Karl Andre Bru/source,TED

“Well said! I wonder how much this womam was paid to give this talk? As you say bread has only four ingredients. Ideally they should be organic as other wheat is sprayed I don’t know how many times and retains the dangerous toxins in the valuable bran layers. White bread is a non food in fact a consultant surgeon friend of ours actually called it poison. People who eat white bread are likely to supper from diverticular disease caused by constipation and ultimately they may even get cancer of the bowl which is the chemical manifestation of constipation.” – Neville Gay/source,TED

“Wonderbread(white sliced bread) may be a good solution in an underdeveloped country where people are starving to death. In the Land of Choice (a/k/a USoA), the qualitative difference between the white bread and whole grain virtually punches you in the face…” – AJ/ source nextnature

“…the point is still very valid – that population growth will only be aggravated by having more food available. Though not the most humanitarian perspective. It’s a very likely and unfortunate case.” – meemers542 / source – YouTube

Bread and salt

Mircea Cantor – Stranieri

Exhibited in Roma – Magazzino d’Arte Moderna
2007 dec. 15

Hard to translate the title of the work “Stranieri“. It means something like a:  foreigner, stateless, homeless, fugitive, hobo, beggar, junkie, vagabond…

artforum-mircea-cantor

Bread fight

Vetró Barnabás – We haunt Udvartér

happening, the artist and 3 participants(friends) –  2009, 5’th October
location: Lábas Ház, Sepsiszentgyörgy/Seklerland/Transylvania/Romania

The happening tries to reveal the idea of holiness associated with bread. Because of this reason, the participants given their religious and artistic belief, have changed the outcome compared to what the artist had in mind. It should be known, that the happening evokes a loose common work similar to the very first breadblog work of Vetró Barnabás.

Description of the happening by the artist:

The paintings hanging on the wall of the exhibition space had been flipped and afterwards I had brought in the breads, hidden under my T-shirt. They had already been pealed, I had left them in the center and I went next to the wall. In front of me, my three guests was in front of the three windows. I had thrown at them and they had standed my attacks. There has been someone who had threw back a couple of times, or was simply eating bread. The camera that was positioned in the corner, was recording the events. Afterwards, photos have been taken of the space. Translation: Etelka Tamás

Another empty slice of bread

Hans-Peter Feldmann– Bread

object  –  2009,
artist born and lives in Düsseldorf
exhibition: 11′th International Istambul Biennial

“Bread (2008) consists of a slice of bread, the middle of which has been eaten, so that the remaining crust frames an absence and emptiness. The crust is shown on the white museum pedestal as a sculpture. Evoking metaphors of bread as a symbol of life and labour, but also of precariousness and poverty, this small, modest work possesses true monumentality” – text source

empty bread

Bread wrapped with money

Mladen Stilinović – Works with food

object  –  1978 -2009,
artist born in Belgrade. Lives in Zagreb
exhibition: 11’th International Istambul Biennial

“Since the mid-1970s, Mladen Stilinović has developed artistic strategies using ‘poor’ materials. His works are simple in their execution and engage with such subjects as pain, poverty, death, power and the language of repression, as ongoing and mutually connected conditions. Usually the title is inscribed into the work itself, for example, in a series dealing with food: Geometry for the poor, Cabbage, Borecole, Potato, Bean, Leek, Corn, Cakes, I bite myself, I devour myself, Eat yourself, Bite yourself and Charge, cakes!” – text source

money wrapped bread
photo credit: Estefán Arnold

VB65

Vanessa Beecroft – VB65

live performance  –  2009 March ,
location: PAC (Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea)- Milan
duration:3 hour

Vanessa’s performance Vb65 is  a  “Last Supper” of  20 African immigrants, legal and illegal, dressed in suits, eating chicken and bread without cutlery, drinking water from the carafe without glasses.  After they finished the meals I see more defencelessness in their eyes than satisfaction. Even the 12 meter transparent table gives the “you can’t hide” feeling.

I’d like to find out what were they thought about in that time.

vanessa-01

vanessa-02

vanessa-03

vanessa-04

vanessa-05

vanessa-06

all the images above are made by yuricrea

Punishment

Tatsumi Orimoto – Punishment

performance  –  2009 February 12 ,
location: ARCOmadrid – international contemporary art fair
represented by: DNA, Berlin

This is the second post (see the first one) with a new performance of Tatsumi. His performance might well make allusion to the crucifixion of 26 Christian missionaries in Japan in the 16th century, as punishment for their perceived destabilising influence. Orimoto thus expresses how the carrier of bread, the bearer of a different other message, is seen as a threat and is persecuted and martyred. Through the bread scattered on the floor in Punishment, we are witnesses to this waste of communication.” (excerpt from the press release).

Untitled

image credit –  vernissage.tv

Click here to watch the video documentation.

This performance was performed also at DND Berlin. Images here.