Aesthetics of Food Porn

Main Article Content

Uku Tooming

Abstract

Enticing food photography which stimulates its viewers’ cravings, often given a dismissive label “food porn,” is one of the most popular contents in contemporary digital media. In this paper, I argue that the label disguises different ways in which a viewer can engage with it. In particular, food porn enables us to engage in cross-modal gustatory imaginings of a specific kind and an image’s capacity to afford such imaginings can contribute to its artistic merit.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Article Details

How to Cite
Tooming, U. (2021). Aesthetics of Food Porn. Crítica. Revista Hispanoamericana De Filosofía, 53(157), 127–150. https://doi.org/10.22201/iifs.18704905e.2021.1248

PLUMX Metrics

References

Barrett, D., 2010, Supernormal Stimuli: How Primal Urges Overran Their Evolutionary Purpose, W.W. Norton and Company, New York/London.

Briscoe, R., 2018, “Superimposed Mental Imagery: On The Uses of Make-
Perceive”, in F. Dorsch and F. Macpherson (eds.), Perceptual Memory and Perceptual Imagination, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 161–185.

Bryson, N., 1990, Looking at the Overlooked: Four Essays on Still Life Painting, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.

Bullough, E., 1957, Aesthetics: Lectures and Essays, Bowes and Bowes, London.

Carroll, N., 2015, “Defending the Content Approach to Aesthetic Experience”, Metaphilosophy, vol. 46, no. 2, pp. 171–188.

Carroll, N., 2002, “Aesthetic Experience Revisited”, The British Journal of Aesthetics, vol. 42, no. 2, pp. 145–168.

Coward, R., 1984, Female Desires: How They Are Sought, Bought and Packaged, Grove Weidenfeld, New York.

Currie, G., 2010, “Tragedy”, Analysis, vol.70, no. 4, pp. 632–638.

Doggett, T. and A. Egan, 2012, “How We Feel about Terrible, Non-Existent Mafiosi”, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 84, no. 2, pp. 77–306.

Elder R.S. and A. Krishna, 2012, “The Visual Depiction Effect in Advertising: Facilitating Embodied Mental Simulation through Product Orientation”, Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 38, pp. 988–1003.

Heathwood, C., 2007, “The Reduction of Sensory Pleasure to Desire”, Philosophical Studies, vol. 133, no. 1, pp. 23–44.

Holmes, B., 2017, Flavor: The Science of Our Most Neglected Sense, W.W. Norton and Company, New York/London.

Kim, Y., 2018, “Sell your Loneliness: Mukbang Culture and Multisensorial Capitalism in South Korea”, in L. Lim and H.-K. Lee (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Cultural and Creative Industries in Asia, Routledge, pp. 225–238.

Korsmeyer, C., 2002, Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy, Cornell University Press, Ithaca/London.

Kozinets, R., A. Patterson and R. Ashman, 2016, “Networks of Desire: How Technology Increases our Passion to Consume”, Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 43, no. 5, pp. 659–682.

Levinson, J., 2005, “Erotic Art and Pornographic Pictures”, Philosophy and Literature, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 228–240.

McDonnell, E.M., 2016, “Food Porn: The Conspicuous Consumption of Food in the Age of Digital Reproduction”, in P. Bradley (ed.), Food, Media and Contemporary Culture: The Edible Image, Palgrave Macmillan, London, pp. 239–265.

Maes, H., 2011, “Art or Porn: Clear Division or False Dilemma?”, Philosophy and Literature, vol. 35, no. 1, pp. 51–64.

Matthen, M., 2015, “Play, Skill, and The Origins of Perceptual Art”, British Journal of Aesthetics, vol. 55, no. 2, pp. 173–197.

Nguyen, C.T. and B. Williams, 2020, “Moral Outrage Porn”, Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, vol. 18, no. 2, pp. 147–172.

Petit, O., A.D. Cheok and O. Oullier, 2016, “Can Food Porn Make Us Slim? How Brains of Consumers React to Food in Digital Environments”, Integrative Food, Nutrition and Metabolism, vol. 3, pp. 251–255.

Piech, R.M., M.T. Pastorino and D.H. Zald, 2010, “All I Saw Was the Cake. Hunger Effects on Attentional Capture by Visual Food Cues”, Appetite, vol. 54, pp. 579–582.

Piqueras-Fiszman, B. and C. Spence, 2012, “The Influence of the Color of the Cup on Consumers’ Perception of a Hot Beverage”, Journal of Sensory Studies, vol. 27, no. 5, pp. 324–331.

Podro, M., 1998, Depiction, Yale University Press, London.

Prescott, J., 2015, “Multisensory Processes in Flavour Perception and Their Influence on Food Choice”, Current Opinion in Food Science, vol. 3, pp. 47–52.

Prince, R., 2014, “How We’re Fed 434 Hours of TV Cookery a Week – But the More They Show, the Less We Cook”, Daily Mail Online, 26th September. Downloaded from https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2771553/How-fed-434-hours-TV-cookery-week-cook.html [accessed: 01/11/2018]

Rea, M.C., 2001, “What Is Pornography?”, Noˆus, vol. 35, no. 1, pp. 118–145.

Rousseau, S., 2014, “Food “Porn” in Media”, in P.B. Thompson and D.M. Kaplan (eds.), Encyclopedia of Food and Agricultural Ethics, Springer Netherlands, pp. 748–754.

Schopenhauer, A., 1969 [1819], The World as Will and Representation, vol. 1, trans. E.E. Payne, Dover, New York.

Simmons, W.K., A. Martin and L.W. Barsalou, 2005, “Pictures of Appetizing Foods Activate Gustatory Cortices for Taste and Reward”, Cerebral Cortex, vol. 15, no. 10, pp. 1602–1608.

Sinhababu, N., 2017, Humean Nature: How Desire Explains Action, Thought, and Feeling, Oxford University Press, New York.

Small, D.M. and J. Prescott, 2005, “Odor/Taste Integration And the Perception of Flavor, Experimental Brain Research”, vol. 166, no. 3–4, pp. 345–357.


Spence, C., 2017, Gastrophysics: The New Science of Eating, Viking, New York.

Spence, C., 2015, “On the Psychological Impact of Food Colour”, Flavour, vol. 4, no. 21, pp. 1–6.

Spence, C., K. Okajima, A.D. Cheok, O. Petit and C. Michel, 2016, “Eating with Our Eyes: From Visual Hunger to Digital Satiation”, Brain and Cognition, vol. 110, pp. 53–63.

Spence, C. and B. Piqueras-Fiszman, 2014, The Perfect Meal: The Multisensory Science of Food and Dining, John Wiley and Sons, New Jersey.

Spence, C., C.A. Levitan, M.U. Shankar and M. Zampini, 2010, “Does Food Color Influence Taste and Flavor Perception in Humans?”, Chemosensory Perception, vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 68–84.

Stecker, R. 2006, “Aesthetic Experience and Aesthetic Value”, Philosophy Compass, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1–10.

Sweeney, K.W., 2012, “Hunger Is the Best Sauce: the Aesthetics of Food”, in D.M. Kaplan (ed.), The Philosophy of Food, University of California Press, Berkeley, pp. 52–68.

Toepel, U., J.F. Knebel, J. Hudry, J. le Coutre and M.M. Murray, 2009, “The Brain Tracks the Energetic Value in Food Images”, Neuroimage, vol. 44, no. 3, pp. 967–974.

Uidhir, C.M., 2009, “Why Pornography Can’t Be Art”, Philosophy and Literature, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 193–203.

Van Brabandt, P. and J. Prinz, 2012, “Why do Porn Films Suck?”, in H. Maes and J. Levinson (eds.), Art and Pornography: Philosophical Essays, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 161–190.

Velasco, C., M. Obrist, O. Petit and C. Spence, 2018, “Multisensory Technology for Flavor Augmentation: A Mini Review”, Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 9, pp. 1–6.