Why make fake food and why it matters.
While some people are blessed with the palate and skills to transform the simplest ingredients to delectable dishes, I on the other hand, use clay and resin to do the same. Looks just as appetising, albeit inedible.
I make hyper-realistic food models, or what the Japanese would term as shokuhin sampuru. It is what you see outside of Japanese restaurants, 1:1 scale of dishes that the restaurants serve.
It is my amusement outside of work, an analog break away from the digital world we live in. It’s mixing paint and clay, it’s primitive, I love it.
The elemental compulsion of experiencing the deep satisfaction of refining the smallest details of something to an exacting finish; to know the pride and suppressed glee of finally unveiling a completed work to the world — even if the population of that world numbered just one person — and saying, “I made this for you.”
Steve Vassallo
Yet beyond the craft and this inherent designer need to create something with my hands, making fake food models has, more importantly, helped me make art relatable and understandable. It is my way of showing what creatives can do, encouraging the appreciation of creativity and unorthodox ways of approaching the everyday. Inspiring people, provoking curiosity and excitement.
Food is special.
Maybe the obsession about food is a Singaporean thing, but food is special. It has that ability to connect people, to transport us to another time and place. It is the excuse to ask someone out on a date, the conversation starter when you don’t know what to say. It is the reason for friends to meet, the comfort when you are far away from home. It is culture, it is identity.
Each dish tells a story. Tom Yum Instant Noodles — Not exactly the top 10 dishes to eat when you visit Singapore, but it was what I would eat with friends after school (we were about 14). We would buy the cup version and have it outside at the HDB void decks nearby before going back for after school activities. (Sometimes we would decide not to go back to school after, but let’s not dwell on that.) Fast-forward 6 years later, when I was studying in the UK. On every flight home, I would refuse airline food. Instead, I would request for a bowl of tom yum instant noodles that I knew the airline would stock. It has never sat well with the stewardesses, but it was a taste of home, comfort that I felt I deserved after being away for so long.
When you recreate a dish, you tap into that magic that food brings. You encapsulate all its glories, along with the stories, memories and sensorial emotions that it evokes.
In place of taste, you create levitation!
Sculpting allows you the power to freeze and capture a significant moment in time, and also add fascination and wonder to a simple bowl of noodles.
(Fake) Food connects people.
Fake food is food — something anyone can understand. This art is not abstract. If it is mistaken for dinner, it is an accomplishment. Not everyone can recreate a food dish and make it hyper-realistic, but everyone can acknowledge the effort, the idea, and skill it takes to do so.
Since I started making fake food, my parents have also started being more involved in what I do. Like a true blue asian parent, my mum takes great pride in critiquing my artwork. Highly invested in ensuring that my creations are a success. Sometimes she gets involved in the creation process, lending an extra helping hand, or eagerly checking (in the middle of the night) to see if the resin has dried.
Creatives can be difficult people to figure out, and we (or in this case, me) don’t make it easy or bother to be understood either.
“So what is it that you do?” is a question that often takes too much effort to reply. I guess my parents have always tried to be as supportive as possible, but could never work out how to best do so.
With food, it is common ground. Making fake food has given me a means of communicating how I perceive and understand the world around me: sensitivity for colour and texture, my thoughts and experiences etc. Things that are hard to express verbally. Having my mum involved in the creation process, she empathises and recognises where she can, however small, show her support for what I do. For which, I am truly grateful.
Why this matters.
Craft develops your ability to work with your hands and hold the knowledge in your body of how you play with the materials. To create something out of nothing, to know the touch, the weight, the texture, the smell, and the colour of the materials. This is an intimate knowledge that can only be learnt through the experience of creating something, whether it is making plastic fake food models, painting, music, dancing or cooking, etc. Such experiences has reaffirmed what I know I’m good at, and has kept me excited and motivated. Similarly, I’ve also learnt that I cannot cook, and should stick to making fake food. My point is: the experience of creating something is meaningful. It can help reassure and find what makes you, you.
Also, art does not have to be and isn’t always complicated or abstract. It can be simple and easy to understand. If it is able to engage and inspire, ideally elicit emotion in people, making the everyday magical — it is mission accomplished. This can help encourage the appreciation and understanding of creativity and unconventional thinking, fostering a more open world for all of us to live in.
“My idea is to bring happiness, respect, vision, poetry, surrealism and magic [to design]”.
Philippe Starck
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Thanks for reading! If you’d like to see more fake food models, feel free to add me on Instagram: @itchyhandsvan.
