Food Photography: Art vs Practicality
Gourmet magazine, and the rise of what food photography is today
I recently finished reading Save me the Plums by Ruth Reichl, in which she documents her time as editor-in-chief for the now obsolete Gourmet magazine. It reminded me of when I was taking art in High School and I started exploring food photography and what that looked like through the ages.
I dug up old cookbooks and magazines my mom hadn’t looked at in years, and I also delved into old recipes from badly lit and grainy PDF files strangers put up on the internet. Back then, what struck me, more than the photography itself, were the recipes: jell-o salads with shrimp, bananas covered with ham, and interesting ways to use hot-dogs.
While reading Reichl’s book, though, the food sounded more akin to what is on my plate today, so I was mesmerized by the way in which she described the kitchen’s creative process. Gourmet was about food, but to be about food, it ultimately had to be about how that food looked. In the book, the reader gets glimpses into this creative process, into how things were photographed and designed to look, and how at a certain point in time, recipes also changed to be more photographable and magazine design friendly.
I didn’t look at a lot of photos while reading, so when I finished and looked them up, I was surprised to not be that impressed.
For example, If I had been shooting this cover today, I probably would have styled the martini glasses differently and would have simplified the color palette. What the book describes as absolutely incredible photography, to me looked like basic and often somewhat bland shots.
Gourmet magazine published its last issue in 2009. I was five years old.
I grew up with social media, with phones becoming indispensable, and synonymous with who we were. It’s easy for me to say that this photo is not that groundbreaking because photography, perception, and access to technology have changed drastically since Gourmet closed sixteen years ago, let alone in the last 38 years since this photo was taken.
When Yanes, who shot a lot of Gourmet’s photos, died a couple of years ago, his obituaries said that he revolutionized food photography. And now, looking back, I can see that he did. As the NYT put it, “food photography in cookbooks and magazines was typified by a lifestyle sensibility that placed a gauzy focus on everything but the food itself.” By making food the star of every scene, Yanes changed the game. In 1987, shooting Martini glasses from below, as to highlight their importance, their almost regal quality was a huge creative risk, and the only reason why it doesn’t look very crazy today is because of the path that people like Yanes helped pave.
What at first glance I saw as just glossy icing or enticing pomegranates, I now see, like I’m sure Ruth Reichl did, as the first time that these ingredients and products were held at the forefront of the conversation. The photos were not about the act of a meal, they were about the meal itself.
Today, food photography is a genre in its own right, but before Gourmet’s era, it was barely on the radar at magazine award shows. Photojournalists and fashion photographers, who routinely swept the photography categories, likely never imagined that images of food could compete on the same artistic level. That is until Gourmet changed the game, winning Best Photography at the National Magazine Awards, and twice.
When I think about it, it’s silly that food photography was ever not hailed as the art form that in can be. I remember seeing Edward Weston’s Pepper No 30 when I was learning about lighting techniques, and how, alongside my classmates, I squinted at the projector screen trying to make out what the black and white figure was. Now it’s evident that it's a pepper, but back then, even though I tilted my head and tried to imagine it, I couldn’t even say with certainty that it was a photograph.
Maybe between then and early Gourmet years, we forgot what a photograph could do, what it could transmit. Photography didn’t start as a way to visually sell an idea or a concept, it started as a way to interpret what we were already seeing in different ways. The pepper series is shocking because it’s unlikely that the viewer has ever thought of the subject outside the context of a kitchen or a garden. Having it here, abstractly and in black and white, makes the viewer think, wonder. What else are we missing because we aren’t looking creatively enough?
To an extent, Yanes’ tenure at Gourmet, and Gourmet as a whole, brought a little of that spark back. During the same time frame, under Reichl’s editorial guise, the magazine published incredible pieces that made readers re-think what they consume,1 and how they consume it, bringing bold commentary to a category of writing that really needed it.
Although it took me a second to see it, I now understand that the photography was doing the same thing, Gourmet wasn’t just styling meals, it was starting to test the limits of how food could be seen.
Thanks for reading! I’ll see you next time.
While writing this, I found out that
is on Substack as well!! She also recently wrote about one of my favorite moments in the book: Paris on a budget.I’ve been obsessed with Joe Greer’s recent work for Bandit Running, and also with Michael Stone’s Oura Ring campaign.
Lastly, for the curious, some of my own food photography.
David Wallace Well’s “Consider the Lobster”