Chocolate: The Exhibition at the Indiana State Museum satisfies with its vintage ads, wrappers and boxes along side a history of the tasty treat and its spread throughout the world. The sweetest surprise was sitting on giant chocolates in their wrappers (actually cushioned seats) at the end of the exhibition. The exhibit highlighted decorative objects used to serve chocolate, as well as the design of chocolate’s packaging. However, I didn’t see any chocolate art.
Edible art? Artists use unusual mediums these days, including chocolate. Artist Jean Wertz Zaun specializes in creating chocolate sculptures and paintings that are to be kept and cherished as works of art in their own right. In fact, last August, Zaun was commissioned by the Henry Ford Museum to create a chocolate painting to enhance their showing of Chocolate: The Exhibition. And among others, the Toledo Museum of Art commissioned 37 of Zaun’s works in chocolate to enhance their Van Gogh Fields exhibit in 2003. View a gallery of her museum commissions here.
Other artist have succeeded in this sweet medium including Sid Chidiac who creates edible art, fashion and body painting. Another is Chef Gary Petzl who uses chocolate as both a medium and a working material for sculptures, often creating entire exhibitions. Zaun suggests visiting the Chocolarte Web site to learn more about artists working in chocolate globally.
According to Chocolarte, the concept behind the art is to re-examine our perception of chocolate solely as food and to examine other everyday assumptions. “In using chocolate as an art medium, the viewers are asked to cross the bridge of assumption, of meaning and definition. If this bridge can be crossed then by extension the viewers can rethink the meaning and value of any and all signs in art, in language, in perceptions and in the conclusions they draw. We take chocolate to be a pure and simple pleasure, the dream of a child. We never question this.”
One affordable item that Zaun makes are miniature chocolate paintings delivered in their own gift box. They are white and dark chocolate, food coloring and edible gold, and come in numerous homages like Andy Warhol, Van Gogh, Kahlo and Munch. They sell for $25 each. As for the neighborhood trick-or-treaters…they get her duds!
Photo credit: Munch’s Scream ©2006-08 Jean Zaun
October 29th, 2008 at 7:57 am
I found that the best part of the exhibit was the inter-active displays that challenged visitors to test their knowledge of chocolate.
The history of chocolate and the treat evolved over the years was also very informative.
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