Feast & Famine

Paul Robeson Gallery 

Our class went on a field trip to Paul Robeson Galleries at Rutgers University. The exhibit they have is called “Feast & Famine”. “Feast & Famine” explores food as a social, political and bodily experience. This whole exhibit is to enlighten people about the importance of food and the cost of plastic in the environment. Even if this does not relate to my topic, one of the exhibits that caught my eye is from one of the series of “Thin”. This caught my attention because this is one of the problems that everyone is facing. Obesity and eating disorders are still going on today and without proper treatment the people who suffer from these will not experience having a normal life. However, with people who suffer from these problems seek for help their transformation will give hope to others who does not look for help. Going around the exhibit I did not really find much for my project because the exhibits that were displayed were mostly about food and nothing really about the Ocean. The closest artwork I found close to my project are “Water Bottles” by Willie Cole and “Water is Life” by Nicolas Lampert. These artworks were the only ones I am able to relate for my project. 

            Nicolas Lampert’s artwork, “Water is Life” is about the Dakota Access Pipeline. The Dakota Access Pipeline runs from the shale oil fields in northwest North Dakota and continues through South Dakota and Iowa to an oil terminal near Patoka, Illinois. A lot of people were against this pipeline because not only it was issued by Trump, but it also crosses states that does not have much water to drink. Even though there was a lot of protest about this, the construction of the pipeline did not stop and was finished on April 2017. The image was made alongside with “#NO DAPL” and Stand with Standing Rock campaign. 

            As for Willie Cole’s “Water Bottles” this is close to my project because it deals with plastic that is scattered around the Earth not only on the streets but also in the Ocean. When I first saw this when I came in the gallery, this caught my eyes because I thought it looked like a bubble wrap from the distant. But when I got closer to it, it was all water bottles pressed in together. This gallery was pretty interesting even though I did not find any work that is close to my project.