MY COOKING
performance in Antakya starts from my "costume play"(cos-pre in
Japanese) 2 days earlier on the opening day of the Antakya Biennale. The
visual effect of this cos-pre gives all the local people or artistic
attendents an idea of tradition or nationality. This leads my promotion
towards my performance which gives another question about the definition
of artist-is an artist genius or a good self-promoter?
 |
| Opening Day for Antakya Biennial |
Cos-pre gives a lot of visual exposure especially in Japanese trend
of cos-pre culture, whereas I tried to explain more about what I was
wearing rather than being an 18th century Josun Dynasty woman with a
precious look on my face. Whenever any audience asks a question where
this from, why Korean people have these shoes, these patterns of
clothes, I explained as much as possible with my knowledge from Korean
Studies which I studied at univeristy. All the connections between
Europe and Korea goes towards Silk Road. Of course, the trade merchants
and diplomats are part of the stories, but we are living in 21st century
now with all the history behind us.
The research process is about how to improvise ingredients. Human being
has delevoped several different ways of food culture in different area
with environmental reasons mainly. Therefore, this ingredient research
process is about how human being finds the way to good as close as
possible to what they want from their minds-in my case, Korean food. At
the end of the research process, rather than being a part of Antakya
cuisine, I find my own way to interpret the ingredient in Korean way.
However, this is very problematic. What is Korean way? I ask a lot of
questions 'Bu ne?' towards all kinds of food in Turkey, but in many
cases they will say 'traditional turkish food', however, do these dishes
exist from Republic of Turkey then? What is tradition? What is
traditional Korean food?
 |
| In front of Antakya Sofrası |
On the cooking day, I wear very modern style costume instead of
Josun Dynasty cos-pre and I listen to all the Korean pop songs from
70-80s when we had a lot of rules to follow in Korea. No long hair for
men, no short skirt for women. Just like no woman will show their ankle
to any other man in Josun Dynasty. What we ate at the performance was
similar to early Josun Dynasty food, except the cucumber with pepper
powder which was brought to Korea after we had a war between Korea and
Japan in 1592. Therefore, I didn't put much salt in the food at all, but
some since people eat too salty food without feeling guilty about
putting too much salt in their lives. The taste might get better with
salt, but this doesn't mean your health will get better with salt. In
many cases for high blood pressure, salt can be quite dangerous,
however, taste comes first than ourlives, just like those who smoke for
'taste' not for health. In addition, we missed Kimchi which functions as
one of the healthy food in Korea.
 |
| Photo by Başak |
Korean food is not just about Korean food, though. There are so many
rules that you have to follow in different cuisine. I remember the
first day that I had to use knife and forks which was taught by my
father. The etiquette we have to keep while we eat is very dominant in
the process of feeding our bodies. During my performance, I act as a
power holder who commands how to eat. Rice should be on your left side,
soup should be on your right side, you shouldn't lift up any bowl, you
should use spoon for rice and soup, rest of the dishes with chopsticks,
do this, don't do this. While the audience are busy for eating, the
whole performance goes towards full of orders and rules as well as
misunderstanding or anti-will to sneak out towards what the audience
feels more comfortable with. They might ask forks, they might try to
lift up their bowls, but I keep commanding dos and don'ts. At the end,
it becomes such a chaos, but everyone is eating something in some way
they found.
This is
quite a bit of life patter we live in everyday. We fight over the rules
we have. The food we had goes into our flesh and bones, whether you
wanted or not, and it will make each cell out of your food which you
choose. All the improvised ingredients must be your everyday choice for
your food or your art. The way we eat must be also the way we live in
everyday-we listen to all the orders from commanders or from some
agreements we have, sometimes we call this 'society' then we sometimes
follow the rules or break the rules, of course whether we wanted or not.
 |
| Serving food and "scolding" people |
Finally we didn't eat 'traditional' food. We ate our choice from our
selection with power game. I am not a professional shef who had been
trained for a long time to get a certificate or anything, so alternative
I am. Who says 'tradition' is conservative? Everyday we live in this
tradition and whenever we eat any food, we will keep saying 'this is a
traditional food in my nation' even though 'this food' could have come
from a couple of thousands years ago, just like alcohol we drink
everyday or any crops, etc. with the rules which we are not good at
following. No. we are just eating 'improvised creativity'.
