CONTAINER RAPSODY/Alchemical Kitchen was an artistic residency in Milan in which I participated, hosted and curated by terzo paesaggio and The Gramounce last October.
During the residency, guests with an interest in fermentation were invited to gather and camp in the garden of an abandoned primary school in Chiaravalle, a magical place South-East of the city, to design an alchemical kitchen of food-related practices.
[Image 1] Walking through an abandoned railroad while exploring Chiaravalle, by Luz Del Carmen
Apart from our accomodation, the place was well equipped for our time spent there together. Inside, the ex-gym with a dark green floor became the space where most of the activities happened, including cooking and eating. There, we had a temporary kitchen made up for the occasion, equipped with stoves, induction plates, freshly delivered veggies, spices and jars of ferments. In the garden was a container set up as a working micro-bakery lab.
The idea behind this gathering was to contribute to the design of another container lab as an alchemical kitchen. Each of us there shared an interest in fermentation and its application as a metaphor. My first impression of the place was as a jar where we all aerobically fermented our ideas.
Before arriving, we were asked to bring a book and/or ingredient significant to us to be shared. I brought both: a little test tube filled with some of my dried sourdough starter, and Humankind: Solidarity with Non-Human People (2019) by Timothy Morton.
Alongside the programming, we decided to improvise a little activation ritual right after our first dinner. Before leaving the huge tables where we ate, discussed, chilled, and fermented, we decided to activate the sourdough starter I brought. There was a huge bowl with some water through which we passed our hands, together with the test tube filled with my sleeping powder. For the first round, each of us took a pinch of it and spilt it in the bowl. The white grains slowly sank into the water. In the second round, each of us dipped our hands in and gently dissolved the starter into the water. After this, I gave my final touch, and we left the bowl resting on the table overnight before going to bed.
[Image 2] Activating matter, by Denise di Summa
The next day, when we came back to the tables still yawning with our steaming teas and coffees in hand, the sticky moisture in the bowl was filled with bubbles. The fermentation had been activated! From that moment on we started fermenting. Everyone shared their personal stories and what moved them to be there. No matter where we came from and what kind of studies or experience we had, our art practices and our need to find meaning in our existence brought us together. In this, fermentation was the common language which enriched that space. Many joyful things proceeded to happen as fermenting humans were ready to burst with ideas.
From that moment on, my sleeping sourdough starter continued to move and spread with me, sharing its life with alchemical moments yet to come.
______
This article is a contribution from one of the participants of The Gramounce Food & Art Alternative MA 2024-25. Their writing is inspired by one of our seminars, or responds to a similar field of interest within food & art.
Just as a loaf spontaneously ferments, my research with bread is a deliberately undisciplined practice that allows me to unfurl and overcome my human boundaries with all my senses.
As a nomadic baker, I wander around collecting elders' stories about bread-making to design them into an ever-evolving ecology of practices. As a gastronome, my daily relationship with food makes me question the ethics and meaning of methods of production, transformation, and consumption.
My contributions to the Gramounce form part of my philosophical research into bread which started while studying gastronomy at the University of Gastronomic Science in Pollenzo (IT). It has since developed into my Master’s thesis on local ecological knowledge around bread-making.
