Yours in Food, John Baldessari: with meditations on eating by Paul Auster, David Byrne, Dave Eggers, David Gilbert, Tim Griffin, Andy Grundberg, John ... O'Brien, Francine Prose, and Peter Schjeldah
Conceptual artist Baldessari’s latest book (after The Metaphor Problem Again) looks a bit like a high-end impulse buy: every few pages there are manipulated photos of food and eaters; in between one can find short essays and stories by famous folks. The broad theme of food holds the whole party together, allowing Paul Auster’s memories of poverty in his young adulthood (excerpted from The Red Notebook) to rub shoulders with musician David Byrne’s intriguing but abruptly curtailed thoughts on "knifeless eating" and writer John Haskell’s short story "Toast." Art critic Peter Schjeldahl contributes a meandering essay on "taste" and Glenn O’Brien tosses in memories of his halcyon days in Andy Warhol’s New York, offering such insights as "Madonna had funny ideas about wine" and "when Max’s Kansas City closed... the abstract painters all had tabs in the five figures... The figurative painters were much more modest in their spending." The best of the group may be David Gilbert’s scathing satire "How to Cook a Turkey," in which a mother gives cooking instructions to her family and, in the process, reveals all her resentments and fears. Baldessari’s photographs, many of which seem to be film stills, are edited and cropped so as to obscure the subjects’ faces and shift the focus to the ritual of eating. This unusual perspective adds to the slightly menacing quality of the book, which should appeal to the artist’s fans but may leave other readers more uneasy than sated. Photos.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.