In cinema’s short and dense history, there have been few stars as monumental and influential as food. Whether it’s the cannoli in The Godfather, the lobsters in Annie Hall, or the timpano in Big Night, food provides audiences with (forgive me) a visual feast.
This Saturday, Cine-Gastronomy is a three-hour food and film “sensorial” experience showcasing several artists and chefs from the Bay Area. Thrown by 500 Capp Street (where the event is being held), independent film collective Canyon Cinema, and non-profit gallery Southern Exposure, the event will showcase nine films and one live performance by vocalist Roco Córdova across five rooms.
The event will tap several films from Canyon’s archive, including work from the East Bay documentary filmmaker Les Blank, experimental filmmaker Amy Halpern, and Mexican-American visual artist Naomi Uman, among others.
Guests will snack on culinary pairings made by visual artist Whitney Vangrin, baker Shirin Makaremi, Chez Panisse chef Roshan Prieto, artistic collaboration Palm Assembly (Sylvia Hughes-Gonzales and Ebti), and neighborhood bakeries Kahnfections and Fox and Lion. Oakland-based Shapeshifters Brewery and multimedia artist Connie Zheng will be crafting the drinks.
The food-film pairing goes beyond dinner-and-a-movie: It’s about letting one form speak to another. When Blank first released Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers in 1980, he recommended that theaters cook ten heads of garlic in a toaster oven to enhance the viewing experience.
One wonders what he suggested they do when screening 1980’s Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe, which shows the famously dour director doing just that after losing a bet to Errol Morris. That shoe was made into an apparently edible soup by Alice Waters, and for the upcoming event Prieto will be serving a winter vegetable soup with chermoula and homemade crouton (minus the Clarks).
Other pairings include a large Barbara Hammer-inspired edible still life, as well as a mushroom-infused spun sugar dish that includes nori Vangrin harvested in Bodega Bay and chili powder from Berkeley fermenters Cultured Pickle Shop to accompany Azucena Losana’s Tigre Del Carbon (2022). “It's about approaching food as both like a material and a metaphor,” she told me.
Shirin Makaremi, who works as an independent curator and hosts cake pop-ups on the side, will be serving coffee-soaked vanilla sponge cake with layers of pâte à bombe buttercream, topped with cocoa powder and chocolate-covered espresso beans to accompany Dorothy Wiley’s 1977 film Coffee. She said she felt inspired by daily rituals. “A lot of the films, including Coffee, highlight our daily experiences with food. And I think there is an art in our day-to-day experiences.”
“Food is just like a really lovely way to bring community together around the proverbial table together to share space and support each other and support artists,” said Valerie Imus, the co-director of Southern Exposure. “There's a way in which you can get to deeper social, cultural, political issues through food.”
