Daguerre’s Soup

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The title of this work refers to Louis Daguerre, one of the nineteenth-century inventors of photography. The soup concocted in his name is represented by a chart of its ingredients. However, these ingredients are themselves photographs, whether of 'real' vegetables or of fish made of tissue paper. A label presents the work as if it were a museum exhibit, implying that it belongs to the distant past, perhaps even to Daguerre's era. Although the soup can never be eaten, the photographic images survive in a state of pristine freshness long after 'real' vegetables would have rotted away.

Gallery label, September 2004

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