Abstract
Over the last few years, food and eating have drawn a considerable amount of attention. In the process, the multifaceted relationship between art and design, on the one hand, and food, food presentation, and food en- vironment, on the other, have come to light. The FHNW Academy of Art and Design reacted quickly to this de- velopment by setting up the FoodCultureLab. The Food- CultureLab serves to keep questions relating to food and community on the map and to discuss them on the basis of concrete settings. The fact that good food appeals to the senses is a truism. But what exactly is food: energy, nutrition, a medium of expression through which a culture commu- nicates and articulates itself? The key message here is that food creates a bridge between peoples and cultures. Food has the ability to create a kind of speechless intima- cy; in fact, on the basis of its communicative properties, one could even describe food as a form of speechless language. The present contribution focuses specifically on this aspect of food.