Llio Lloyd-Jones
MA work
MA work
Growing, Cooking and Eating in the Long 18th Century
This dissertation hopes to demonstrate that food has a central and integral place within our material experience and as such should be part of design history. The lack of material evidence – because of its organic state – should be viewed as a challenge and not a reason to deny this subject its proper academic significance.
As organic matter, food represents the bounty of Mother Nature and yet man cannot resist giving her a helping hand. This dissertation projects the 18th century as a period of intense culinary development and looks at the dialogue between nature and artifice as played out in the food chain.
The dissertation begins at the ground, focusing on innovations made in market gardening and livestock rearing which blurred the line between Nature’s benevolence and Man’s ingenuity. The second chapter moves these materials into the kitchen and considers their transformation into food. Using recipe books as primary evidence, I consider how technical culinary knowledge is disseminated and ordered. Searching for elusive references to the visual experience of food, the final section of the dissertation deals with dining. The 18th century dining table celebrated the natural form through ceramic, silver, pastry, sugar and ice, but how did diners view Nature within their dining experience?
I hope to show that during the Enlightenment, the rising importance of artificial order and structure within knowledge existed in the culinary world; the application of such structures removed the production and consumption of food from a natural context.
Info
Info
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MA Degree
School
School of Humanities
Programme
MA History of Design, 2007
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Contact
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07870 188716
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Growing, Cooking and Eating in the Long 18th Century
This dissertation hopes to demonstrate that food has a central and integral place within our material experience and as such should be part of design history. The lack of material evidence – because of its organic state – should be viewed as a challenge and not a reason to deny this subject its proper academic significance.
As organic matter, food represents the bounty of Mother Nature and yet man cannot resist giving her a helping hand. This dissertation projects the 18th century as a period of intense culinary development and looks at the dialogue between nature and artifice as played out in the food chain.
The dissertation begins at the ground, focusing on innovations made in market gardening and livestock rearing which blurred the line between Nature’s benevolence and Man’s ingenuity. The second chapter moves these materials into the kitchen and considers their transformation into food. Using recipe books as primary evidence, I consider how technical culinary knowledge is disseminated and ordered. Searching for elusive references to the visual experience of food, the final section of the dissertation deals with dining. The 18th century dining table celebrated the natural form through ceramic, silver, pastry, sugar and ice, but how did diners view Nature within their dining experience?
I hope to show that during the Enlightenment, the rising importance of artificial order and structure within knowledge existed in the culinary world; the application of such structures removed the production and consumption of food from a natural context.
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Experience
- Lecturer in Cultural History (Modernist and Postmodernist Cultures), University College of Creative Arts, Rochester, 2006-7; Archivist of Credit Card Collection (part-time), British Museum, London, 2006-7; Weekend Manager, David Mellor Design, London, 2003-7