By: Allison Norris
Professor Agata Stronciwilk suggests food as a way to illustrate the relations between feminism, resistance, and political acts. “[Food’s] symbolic and social significance make it a powerful medium to engage in artistic practice,” she stated during her presentation at the Food Matters & Materialities conference, “Food Art and Feminism: The Case of the ‘Black Protests’ in Poland”. Stronciwilk situates several food art exhibits in relation to the Black Protests in Poland – so named for the black clothes women wore during the all-women’s strike on October 3, 2016, to symbolically mourn the death of women’s reproductive rights in Poland – protests which continue as of this writing.
Credits: Illustration by Kit Chokly.
Stronciwilk, assistant professor at Faculty of Fine Arts at Jan Długosz Academy in Częstochowa whose research focuses on food in contemporary art, zeros in on one art exhibition, Gastronomki (roughly translated to “She Gastronomes”). The exhibition was curated by Iwona Demko and Renata Kopyto and held in conjunction with one Black Protest on March 8, 2017. Stronciwilk found this pairing fascinating. “How can you speak about your identity through food?” asks Stronciwilk. “I started looking at this exhibition, the obvious relation between a woman and cooking, which is so strongly rooted in culture, how feminist scholars tried to deal with this topic, to reframe the way we think about the kitchen and about cooking as a form of oppression.”
The Western feminist movement is commonly/arguably associated with three waves: suffrage in the early 1900s; sexual, labour, and legal rights in the 1960s and 70s;and an ongoing third wave stems from late 20th century reconsiderations, which now aim for inclusion of marginalized groups. Similar waves reached Poland much later, particularly in terms of art. “There was this moment 10 years ago when we thought, we have achieved have some kind of equality, and now we can think about moving forward. But we are experiencing a moving back in time… there is a fight for the most basic women’s rights” says Stronciwilk.
What she is describing here corresponds to what Western academics currently call “postfeminism”. Western academics consider postfeminism as sensibility or perception that ideals of the feminist movement have been achieved. Postfeminism simultaneously denies feminism’s contemporary relevance while offering antifeminism under a guise of liberation, specifically sexualized liberation or self-determination. The postfeminist figure in Poland is not one empowered via sexualization but rather typified in the Polish mother figure, who chooses to stay in the kitchen and labour tirelessly to support her family. This might seem like a familiar North American housewife trope, but the martyr-like figure of the Polish mother is part of national identity.
“The Polish mother figure is very deeply rooted in our history. There are a lot of books written about it and very good feminist analysis of how this concept is connected with capitalism, traditionalism, and conservatism. The model Polish mother sacrifices herself for her family,” Stronciwilk elaborates. “This figure is very strongly rooted in our history because there is a lot of suffering in our history. Women in the household were also portrayed as someone who has to suffer. They have to suffer for their families because this is what the nation wants them to – you need to suffer because this is your path to be a patriot.”
While this path might have changed, the tensions persist between traditional national identities, women’s rights and freedoms, and the nation-state itself. Stronciwilk points to an exhibit by artist Małgorzata Markiewicz. The food is weaponized as a critique of the state’s lack of support for women who experience intimate partner or domestic violence. The Resistance Kitchen resembles a cooking show with Markiewizc playing up the Polish mother figure, but as this host details government negligence around domestic violence, she also details deadly recipes. Stronciwilk explains, “feeding becomes not the act of caring but of violence, which is a response to the abuse. The feeding can be understood as a form of power, here in the most radical aspect – power over the life of others.”
The power of food as a medium for art is also more broadly applicable to feminism, as well as to other concerns for women in Poland. The fabled sweet tooth of Polish women is used subversively by two artists in particular. Iwona Demko imprints on homemade cookies disturbing, misogynistic quotes from well-known figures such as politicians, writers, and philosophers. “The sweetness is not sweet – it is used to speak about something very, very difficult, very unsettling,” says Stronciwilk, who identifies that this work, titled “Bez Lukru” (“Without Sugar Coating”), demonstrates the persistence and deeply rooted nature of anti-woman discourse in European culture.
Likewise, Pamela Bożek’s “The One” uses sweets in a political critique. In response to comments by Konstanty Radziwiłł, Poland’s former Minister of Health, on the need to limit emergency contraception because women will eat the like sweets, Bożek hides these contraceptives in chocolate, smuggling them into the gallery space and making them available to anyone who might need them. Perhaps for Stronciwilk, the malleability of food as a medium is evident in the ways foods are used: “You can see different approaches towards this relation between food femininity, feminism, and how to use food to speak about women rights.”
Strociwilk also foregrounds the work of Anna Królikiewicz, an artist who works with taste. A café near the gallery sold Królikiewicz’s tear-flavoured ice cream. Stronciwilk indicates the ice cream built a narrative about the control over women’s bodies through taste and people’s responses. As they experience and ingest the food, people begin to assess their own responses to the flavour and may also begin to ask questions about why it was made and to what it is related. This kind of questioning is made possible only through the combination of food and art and is accessible to the public because it is outside a formalized exhibition space.
While acknowledging the difficulty in assessing the impact of public art, Stronciwilk also points to the importance of the visibility of this art outside the gallery space. “People who are not directly interested in art can somehow see the artworks and maybe this way, it will somehow affect them, or they start to read about the exhibition. They immediately start to think about the topic of the exhibition.” Perhaps simply prompting people to think is a step on a longer journey toward progress or change.
“How can art change the way we think? Does it have any social impact?” asks Stronciwilk. “I believe it does.”