Smoothie Piece
Record everything you eat during a meal
Repeat this for every meal for three days
Gather together the foods on your list
Place all the foods inside a blender and blend.
Pour it out into a cup.
Take a sip
When I began to bounce ideas around for my score, I first looked to existing pieces for reference. Most of my favorite pieces could be executed by a single person, and the ones that really stuck out gave the performer nonsensical or uncomfortable instructions. My biggest inspiration was definitely Yoko Ono’s collection of scores called Grapefruit, which includes a number of works in this vein.
As I began to zero in on my idea, I realized that I wanted to involve food in my piece. Food is a constant in the human experience. Everyone eats food, everyone enjoys food, and everyone appreciates food. Even though food unifies us, it also sets us apart. Some people view food as a means for moral expression, choosing not to eat animal products or food produced by certain companies. Food also marks culture, with every region spawning a number of unique dishes.
At the end I settled on blending together all the foods eaten for three days into a single smoothie and taking a sip. I thought it would be interesting to combine all the different things I’ve eaten into one substance, and to combine all of the tastes I’d experienced into a single sensation. In a weird way the container I kept the smoothie in mirrored my stomach, as both essentially contain the same things.
On my third day I began to gather together all of the foods on my list. At the end of the day I blended them all together and placed the smoothie into a refrigerator. I presented my score in class by reading out the instructions, and taking a sip in front of everyone. One Idea I had was to plan out all of my meals so that the smoothie would taste good, but I decided to just eat what I normally eat: steak, salads, macaroni, and other foods were all blended together into one bizarre amalgamation. When I finally tasted my creation, I regretted that decision, as it tasted so very bad, so bad that I felt a little sick for a few hours.