CONFERENCE: Molecular Cuisine: The Politics of Taste (New York, 19-21 Oct 12)

New York, October 19 - 21, 2012 School of Visual Arts, 335 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10011 USA 

 "Molecular Cuisine: The Politics of Taste" is an interdisciplinary 
conference focusing on desire´s palette. Investigating the importance 

of taste from the perspectives of the culinary arts, sociology, art 
history and theory, anthropology, as well as the cognitive, material 
and biological sciences, the symposium targets intersections between 
taste and value.

 While taste is the key concept in new cooking 
technologies, it also connects to our passions, predilections and 
taboos. 
Researchers from the scientific and cultural spheres ask the 
questions, 
why we enjoy certain foods and not others, why we prefer certain 
styles 
and not others. 

Involving multiple discourses which emphasize the 
senses, emotions and sensory assets, the concept of taste, which is 
traditionally one pertaining to the fine arts or humanities, develops 
a 
renewed relevance in current cultural debates.

 PROGRAM 

Friday October 19, 2012 

4:00-6:00 pm Registration

6:15 - 6:30 pm Introduction
Suzanne Anker 

6:30 - 7:30 pm Keynote Address
Ciaran Bennett : "Humpty Dumpty and the Metamorphosis of Scrambled 
Eggs"
Sabine Flach, Moderator

7:30 - 8:30 pm Keynote Address
Lisa Ma: "Farmification & Speculative Design"
Suzanne Anker, Moderator 

8:30 - 9:00 pm Refreshments

Saturday October 20, 2012
9:00-10:00 am Registration & Continental Breakfast 

10:00-12:30 pm Panel I - Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice
Suzanne Anker: "Sugar and The Crystalline Body"
June de Schino: "The Significance & Symbolism of Sugar Sculpture in 
Italian Banquets (1570 - 1670)"
Heather Hess: "Fickle and Deceitful Desires: Visual Pleasure and the 
Inedible on the Early Modern Banquet Table"
Mathias Viegener: "The Sweetness of Meaning"
Suzanne Joelson, Moderator 

12:30-1:30 pm Lunch 

1:30-3:00 pm Panel 2 - Flavour Foragers
Flavour SenseNation. Kianna Bahrami & Lulie Biggs: "Flavour Sense 
Nation, a symphony of the senses: Our sensory experience of food and 
flavour."
Beth B, Moderator 

3:00-4:00 pm Demonstrations and Coffee Break 

4:00-6:30 pm Panel 3 - Taste Makers
Tom Huhn: "The Taste of Eighteenth Century"
Christian Sauer: "Culinary Aesthetics: Facets and Problems"
Sabine Flach: "There's No Accounting for Taste: Eating, Thinking and 
Arguing in Contemporary Art"
Viktoria von Hofmann: "Art of Taste and Aesthetics of Cooking: A 
History Frank Gillette, Moderator" 

6:30-7:15 pm Cocktails and Conversation
7:30- 9:00pm Open Dinner; pay on your own

Sunday, October 21, 2012 

9:00-10:00 am Registration & Continental Breakfast 

10:00-12:30 pm Panel 4 - Food Chain
Anne McBride & César de Vega: "What is Culinary Innovation? 
Perspectives at the Crossroad of the Kitchen and the Laboratory"
Catherine Chalmers: "Art with an Appetite"
Mark Clintberg: "Gaystronomy [sic]"
Moderator TBD 

12:30-1:30 pm Lunch 

1:30-3:30 pm Panel 5 - Skeleton Feast
Sharon Hecker: "Bitter Sweets by Luciano Fabro for Nadezda 
Mandel´stam"
Fabio Parasecoli: "Savoring Semiotics: Food in Intercultural 
Communication"
Ana Maria Ulloa: "Naming the Ephemeral: Sensory Science and the 
Language of Taste"
Luca Buvoli, Moderator 

3:30-4:00 pm Coffee Break 

4:00-6:30 pm Panel 6 - Don´t play with your food
Elaine Tin Nyo: "On Meat and Mortality"
Ann-Sargent Wooster: "Futurism and Food"
Grahame Weinbren: "Still-life with Banquet"
Caroline Hobkinson: "Dial 1 for Bitter, 2 for Sweet"
Robin Winters, Moderator 

6:30-6:45 pm Conference closure