This is a painting using business cards from Maze, Gordon Ramsey’s restaurant in London. My youngest son worked there as a chef under Jason Atherton. He now works for Sat Bains in Nottingham, to be featured on tonight’s masterchef the professionals on BBC 1. Though his skills in cooking have been due in a large part to my wife’s influence, it makes me wonder how having an artist as a father has made a difference. If you look at the numerous cooking programmes on TV, you realise that art and cooking have several things in common. Presentation is about the arrangement of the various elements on the plate, in the same way an artists primary concerned with texture, contrast, colour and composition. It could be argued that the subtlety and impact of tastes has a direct relationship with the subtlety and impact which artists strive to incorporate in their work through their considered choice of visual elements. It strikes me that when dealing with the wider field of the arts: music, dance, painting, sculpture and “the art of cooking” (the list is endless), the parameters for success in the arts depend wholly on how these separate elements are used to elevate the experience of the viewer and customer beyond the norm. Art is not a closed shop, it can unite the sensitivities of peoples and nations and as a result enrich our experiences and understanding of what life can provide; wonder, inspiration, depth and quality, which in turn can make us strive for greater heights in our own individual fields. So much for cooking, an essential for survival of the species, that is competing with the Turner Prize for artistic recognition. I rest my case for my obscure influence, though I am not holding out too much hope for acknowledgement. Watch the chefs at work and perhaps I can at least argue that this in art?
G