Everything you’d be loathed to see in your kitchen, presented in a striking contemporary compendium of graphic imagery, inspiring recipes, underpinned by social-political commentary: this is Eat The Problem.
A book and exhibition by Kirsha Kaechele from MONA in Hobart – read more about the gallery here – Eat The Problem is a sensory experience of overloaded proportions, forcing its viewers to see, feel, smell and taste like never before. Or at least, insanely rarely.
Fuelled by the reality that faces the Australian ecological system, that is invasive species, creatures and experiences, the Eat The problem exhibition startles visitors through dazzling light, permitting them to taste colour, feel sound vibrations and participate in movement and music.
In a nutshell, Eat the Problem lets visitors engage in various acts of transformation as part of Kaechele’s surrealist exploration of turning flaw into feature using invasive species—including humans—in food and art.
Heralded by a gigantic glockenspiel (like a xylophone), that assumes the role of a dining table that’s been illuminated in the full colour spectrum, MONA’s executive chef Vince Trim has designed a menu that uses invasive species such as deer, sea urchin and thistle and transforms them into sumptuous monochromatic dishes for visitors to eat.
And if you’re not hungry or would like the full experience, the exhibition allows you to book a session to undergo a range of transformative healing sessions in the gallery, including sound baths, reflexology, massage and hot and cold treatments.
“Eat the Problem brings to life the practice of transforming shit into gold through a delightfully experimental and confronting, but outrageously glamorous, feast for the senses. Visitors taste colour, feel sound vibrations and participate in movement and music. Eating their way through the experience they leave transformed and inspired, with a deepened appreciation of systems-based sustainable thinking,” said Kirsha.
Underpinned by the launch of the Eat the Problem book, the exhibit celebrates the a printed series of ‘recipes’ using invasive species, both real and surreal throughout 544 decadent pages. It features the contributions of artists whose work is in Mona’s permanent collection, as well as noted chefs, writers, scientists and philosophers from around the world.
Book your feast and treatments at Mona here. The exhibition will run until 2 September 2019.
