Donald Pittenger writes:

Dear Blowhards --

Why eat chocolate when you can create works of art using it?

What kind of art? Representational art, for one thing. Below are some examples I encountered during my travels this year:

Here's the ocean liner Titanic at the Fassbender & Rausch store in Berlin's Gendarmenmark, a block or so off Friedrichstrasse. I wonder if the ship is solid chocolate or simply a layer spread over a form made of some other material.

This is the Brandenburg Gate. There are more sculptures on display, including one of the Reichstag (pariament) building.

The fancy chocolate shop in Las Vegas' Wynn casino displays this item. I have no clue how they did the drapery -- especially without getting finger prints on it

Chocolate art need not represent anything but itself. Below are two views of what is claimed (if I correctly recall the sign I glanced at) to be the world's largest chocolate fountain. It's at the Bellagio casino / hotel in Las Vegas.

It's more than six feet high...

...and features both dark and light chocolate.

On the other hand ... why create art with chocolate when you can eat it? Suits me.

Later,

Donald

Do any part of these artworks mysteriously disappear periodically---a corner here, a chunk there, from some hungry visitors? I'd think they'd gradually get whittled down, like people who keep taking brownies off the plate before they can get served for dessert!

Posted by: annette on November 28, 2006 10:43 AM

"[P]ariament" is a great typo under Brandenburg Gate. Don't fix it; just throw in the "h" before the "ment".

Posted by: robert on November 28, 2006 11:16 AM

It all looks so gross. Especially the fountain.

Posted by: Tat on November 28, 2006 11:29 AM

Good chocolate that's meant to be eaten is art enough for me! Fun to see people trying to make something else/more about than that. I wonder what moves them. Is there a long history of chocolate-sculpture? Does the kind of people who are into creating desserts overlap with the kind of people who are into creating sculptures? Where are the studies!

BTW, does chocolate tend to decay or rot over time? Will the chocolate ocean liner eventually vanish beneath green algae, for instance? Or is chocolate for the ages?

Posted by: Michael Blowhard on November 28, 2006 1:15 PM

Yes, chocolate decays---see grey, powdery, stale hershey bar left in a coat pocket (or vending machine) too long. I have no idea if they use refridgeration or varnish or something to maintain these sculptures. Of course, varnish would explain why nobody nibbles.

Also, I think they are like ice sculptures. People make chocolate sculptures...because they can.

Posted by: annette on November 28, 2006 1:38 PM

Yah, why does all art have to have meaning? Chocolate sculpture's just cool and that's it! When everyone's forgotten beauty, maybe it's up to commercial artists to keep old traditions of artisanship alive.

Posted by: SFG on November 28, 2006 6:05 PM

I've been to that candy shop in the Gendarmenmarkt and remarked on their TITANIC. They told me it was solid chocolate. I forget how many hundred kilos of chocolate went into the thing.

All they forgot was a little rock candy iceberg in front!

Posted by: chocoholic on December 18, 2006 9:56 AM






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