KITCHEN by Michela Balboni

Private Story

KITCHEN

Copyright Michela Balboni 2024

Date of Work Nov 2019 - Ongoing

Updated Nov 2019

Location japan

Topics Conceptual, Editorial, Essays, Fine Art, Food, Photography

The table, a sacred place, where the human being gathers, to share, hope and escape. Essences of life created by expert hands, passed from hand to hand, swallowed. In the lines of "Kitchen", the writer Banana Yoshimoto fills the existential void of the protagonists with food. "There is no place in the world that I love more than the Kitchen ..." the young orphan Mikage says, and it is in the yellow lights of the kitchens, which illuminate the darkness of the narrow Japanese alleys, in the warmth of a steaming rice bowl, in the care for every detail of ceramics and dishes, that is possible to find a refuge and a cure for body and soul. Food means memories, people who shared a moment with us, who maybe are now just ghosts from the past. The kitchen immediately refers to the most intimate family place. Meal moments are more than nourishment for the body, they are a ritual for getting together with others and with oneself. Food means relationship. Business lunches, romantic dinners, wedding banquets, secular parties and religious celebrations: there is no important moment in our life that is not accompanied by food, which becomes the tool for every type of relationship, from the most intimate and seductive ones, up to business relationships and large collective events, always characterized by highly symbolic food and a rituality that survives time and modernity.