Fotograf Zone – Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft

What can meat, which didn’t cost the life of any non-human being, offer us? Historian Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft begins his book Meat Planet with the 2013 event when the world's first lab-created hamburger was presented to the public. Wurgaft refers to this technology of creating meat from meticulously cultured cells as "emerging" and draws on five years of research to show the political and social connotations associated with the problem of its production. Isn't this way of potentially feeding a starving planet in the future just as harmful as factory farming, just in a more covert way? Should we not generally want less, rather than waiting for salvation in the form of the next new technology? The author combines a historical perspective on the culture associated with meat with the most contemporary ethical and philosophical questions and presents his research in a reader-friendly manner.

Benjamin Aldes Wurgaft. Meat Planet: Artificial Flesh and the Future of Food. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2020. ISBN: 9780520379008

Tereza Špinková

is a theorist and curator. Currently she is studying for a doctorate at the Department of Environmental Studies at the Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University in Brno, where she deals primarily with the relationship between human and non-human entities.

#42 Food

Food is a basic physical need of every living creature. In the context of human society, issues around food and food security are seen as a continuous, necessary process associated with the production, distribution, presentation, consumption and disposal of goods and services. In this constellation, what role does photography play in recording and presenting representations of food and other associated themes related to food issues that address societal customs, traditions, and issues that cut across human and natural history? Food photography is almost never about the food itself. It relates to hierarchies, the division of roles in providing, preparing, serving, and making available one’s own consumption, both in domestic and public settings. It observes culture, structure, quality and targeting in relation to health and the environment. It looks at the professions associated with the phenomenon of food, highlighting open trade, the commerciality of sales, promotion; the importance, function and problematic nature of packaging and waste management. It is interested in the practices and quality of food management. We are witnessing the constant development of the cult of food and food excess. This is a massive expansion of food production, hand in hand with marketing strategies that contribute to a sufficiently authentic experience and convey the product as a unique experience enveloped in a range of positive emotions. The crunch of a crisp, the sound of opening a can of cold drink, the moment of smelling a cup of fresh coffee, the expansion of the taste buds after tasting a piece of chewing gum and the ever glistening, melting rich layer of cheese on a slice of ham pizza are the essential spices of these strategies based on working with the subconscious and reflexes. This is not the end of the spectrum of food-related issues, for on the other side of it is inevitably the starvation of millions of people that cannot be disregarded, the inability to provide affordable sustainable diets along with the biodiversity of ecosystems. What are the environmental challenges currently associated with food production and what will the diet of the future look like?