February 16, 2022
The Hungry Eye: Eating, Drinking and European Culture from Rome to the Renaissance
Leonard Barkan
Class of 1943 Professor in Comparative Literature,
Princeton University
George Bustin, Introducer, and Leonard Barkan
Minutes of the 20th Meeting of the 80th Year
Stephen Schreiber called the meeting to order with 121 members and guests in attendance. Guests (and their hosts) included Miles Gordon (Ugy Horowitz) and Costa Papastephanou (Ralph Widner). David Culverson read the minutes from the previous meeting.
George Bustin introduced Leonard Barkan, Class of 1943 Professor in Comparative Literature, Princeton University.
Professor Barkan’s humorous, non-linear presentation revolved around his new book, The Hungry Eye, exploring food in the art and literature of European Culture.
Barkan believes that food was central in both high and low European culture. He showed a painting by Boucher of one shepherd feeding his Beloved grapes. Virgil wrote of “the simple salad a peasant makes.” In the ruins of Pompei, beautifully designed dining rooms, hundreds of small fast-food establishments and an astonishing number of cooking and serving objects were found. Roman poets, including Horace and Juvenal wrote of overwrought fancy dinner parties; Horace originated the now common phrase Carpe Diem, which Barkan said, “obviously meant “pop the cork!”
There were food references in the Old Testament; Jews stuck in the desert mourning the Egyptian dinners of fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. God reminded them they had manna, maybe not comparable.
Of course, the big Bible story is the apple, an example of our eating our way into fallen mortality. Our downfall was gluttony, not sex.
The Christian New Testament was also food oriented. While Jesus claimed that man does not live by bread alone, many of the stories in the New Testament revolve around mealtimes. There is the infamous Feast of Herod where Salome, having danced her heart out for King Herod, demands the head of John the Baptist served on a platter…and gets it. In fact, Renaissance artists loved depicting this and other banquets, as demonstrated by countless examples.
Barkan moved on to Still Life paintings with some extraordinary examples of mimesis, the depiction of reality in art. Many artists made food, more than any other subject, look exactly like the real thing. Food was clearly painted for eating, not viewing!
Sliding into the 20th century, Barkan gave illustrations of food as metaphor in our own language. We take candy from a baby. A task is a piece of cake. You have egg on your face!
Moving back into multiple depictions of the Last Supper in Western art, the supper table produces a veritable still life of food. The Last Supper is actually a big banquet. In contrast, Eastern Orthodox paintings of the Last Supper are depictions primarily of the First Sacrament and decidedly not of opulent feasts.
In dining rooms, paintings of banquets were often hanging on the walls. Sometimes hosts actually presented pictures of food to their guests as a kind of menu.
In Veronese’s The Feast of the House of Levi, politics and power determined both the seating order and the menu. At one end, the elites got olive oil and lamb, at the other, the deplorables got lamp oil and eel.
As Barkan answered questions, we also learned:
Food-splattered mosaic floors, reflective of eating habits, were frequently featured in banquet paintings.
Food was sometimes an allegorical representation of sex.
Spices, particularly black pepper, were expensive and rare.
The Louvre features food in approximately a third of its still lifes and the Rijksmuseum, in half of its still lifes.
The first cookbook was written by the imprisoned Renaissance humanist Bartolomeo Platina, with more than 500 recipes in Latin. Sadly no one could read it, although it is currently available at Amazon!
Finally, Professor Barkan’s motivation to write this book was his own love of food. He dedicated it to sustenance in dark times, specifically to those who, during Covid, made it possible for him, his wife and others to continue to eat well.
Respectfully submitted,
Julie Denny
George Bustin introduced Leonard Barkan, Class of 1943 Professor in Comparative Literature, Princeton University.
Professor Barkan’s humorous, non-linear presentation revolved around his new book, The Hungry Eye, exploring food in the art and literature of European Culture.
Barkan believes that food was central in both high and low European culture. He showed a painting by Boucher of one shepherd feeding his Beloved grapes. Virgil wrote of “the simple salad a peasant makes.” In the ruins of Pompei, beautifully designed dining rooms, hundreds of small fast-food establishments and an astonishing number of cooking and serving objects were found. Roman poets, including Horace and Juvenal wrote of overwrought fancy dinner parties; Horace originated the now common phrase Carpe Diem, which Barkan said, “obviously meant “pop the cork!”
There were food references in the Old Testament; Jews stuck in the desert mourning the Egyptian dinners of fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. God reminded them they had manna, maybe not comparable.
Of course, the big Bible story is the apple, an example of our eating our way into fallen mortality. Our downfall was gluttony, not sex.
The Christian New Testament was also food oriented. While Jesus claimed that man does not live by bread alone, many of the stories in the New Testament revolve around mealtimes. There is the infamous Feast of Herod where Salome, having danced her heart out for King Herod, demands the head of John the Baptist served on a platter…and gets it. In fact, Renaissance artists loved depicting this and other banquets, as demonstrated by countless examples.
Barkan moved on to Still Life paintings with some extraordinary examples of mimesis, the depiction of reality in art. Many artists made food, more than any other subject, look exactly like the real thing. Food was clearly painted for eating, not viewing!
Sliding into the 20th century, Barkan gave illustrations of food as metaphor in our own language. We take candy from a baby. A task is a piece of cake. You have egg on your face!
Moving back into multiple depictions of the Last Supper in Western art, the supper table produces a veritable still life of food. The Last Supper is actually a big banquet. In contrast, Eastern Orthodox paintings of the Last Supper are depictions primarily of the First Sacrament and decidedly not of opulent feasts.
In dining rooms, paintings of banquets were often hanging on the walls. Sometimes hosts actually presented pictures of food to their guests as a kind of menu.
In Veronese’s The Feast of the House of Levi, politics and power determined both the seating order and the menu. At one end, the elites got olive oil and lamb, at the other, the deplorables got lamp oil and eel.
As Barkan answered questions, we also learned:
Food-splattered mosaic floors, reflective of eating habits, were frequently featured in banquet paintings.
Food was sometimes an allegorical representation of sex.
Spices, particularly black pepper, were expensive and rare.
The Louvre features food in approximately a third of its still lifes and the Rijksmuseum, in half of its still lifes.
The first cookbook was written by the imprisoned Renaissance humanist Bartolomeo Platina, with more than 500 recipes in Latin. Sadly no one could read it, although it is currently available at Amazon!
Finally, Professor Barkan’s motivation to write this book was his own love of food. He dedicated it to sustenance in dark times, specifically to those who, during Covid, made it possible for him, his wife and others to continue to eat well.
Respectfully submitted,
Julie Denny