Start Date
31-5-2022 2:15 PM
End Date
31-5-2022 2:30 PM
Description
In 1870, an illustration entitled “Landing Bananas” appeared in the popular U.S. magazine Harper’s Weekly. The illustration shows piles of banana on a waterfront dock in New York City, attracting the attention of eager customers. This illustration documented the increasing mobility of bananas, which were imported to the United States from Central America and the Caribbean with the help of refrigeration and icebox technologies in the late-nineteenth century. The illustration also reflected the banana’s reputation at the time as an “immigrant” in the United States and a settler “landing” on the shores of “the New World.” While many images helped naturalize the banana in American landscapes and homes, these pictures also disguised the horrific exploitation of land and people that came at the expense of importing the banana to the United States. This presentation uses the banana as a case study for analyzing the complex relationship between art, food, and mobility. In fusing together methodologies from Food Studies, Art History, and Material Culture disciplines, this paper urges scholars to more seriously consider how art mobilizes political messages through food.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21427/6bcd-em81
Landing Bananas: Food and Mobility in U.S. Depictions of Fruit
In 1870, an illustration entitled “Landing Bananas” appeared in the popular U.S. magazine Harper’s Weekly. The illustration shows piles of banana on a waterfront dock in New York City, attracting the attention of eager customers. This illustration documented the increasing mobility of bananas, which were imported to the United States from Central America and the Caribbean with the help of refrigeration and icebox technologies in the late-nineteenth century. The illustration also reflected the banana’s reputation at the time as an “immigrant” in the United States and a settler “landing” on the shores of “the New World.” While many images helped naturalize the banana in American landscapes and homes, these pictures also disguised the horrific exploitation of land and people that came at the expense of importing the banana to the United States. This presentation uses the banana as a case study for analyzing the complex relationship between art, food, and mobility. In fusing together methodologies from Food Studies, Art History, and Material Culture disciplines, this paper urges scholars to more seriously consider how art mobilizes political messages through food.