On a Friday at the cusp of spring, we began to speak on the transcendence of food, art, and humour. María José Casillas, Ella from MalaCara, and myself are each calling in from separate time zones, and all brimming with anticipation.

Sun kisses the street in Guadalajara, Mexico and pedestrian voices decrescendo into white noise. Warm light floods the Zoom background and María José Casillas smiles wide in the forefront. Without pause, she introduces herself as ‘Majo,’ an artist and chef. Thanks to MalaCara—a curatorial project that curates spaces, collaborates with artists, and creates artwork of their own—a dream of Majo’s recently became a reality: her artist debut.

Somewhere between finger-painting turkeys in kindergarten and snapping our laptop shut at five o’clock, we lost our proclivity for fearless experimentation. Modern life bombards us with constant reminders of our social identities. Social media, texts, emails—they define us. In embracing information tracking and self-categorization, we’ve become prisoners of our own personas; our culture has muted any penchant to experiment, to try on different hats, to explore. MalaCara’s latest event series, Playground, speaks directly to this cultural milieu.

The idea for the curatorial project started five years ago when Fidel Paez and Ella Whitby first met studying design in Barcelona. Equally engrossed with the inextricable link between art, design, and intersubjective experiences, the two clicked instantly.

“We both shared a desire to connect with our authentic child-like selves,” Ella begins. “We were on this quest to shift our perspectives together. We had this idea of creating a place without social and personal pressures.” They were pulled to excavate the innocence from the mundane.

MalaCara’s philosophy is rooted in community, creative freedom, experimentation, and playfulness; it promotes these values through merging heritage and contemporary design. Playground is MalaCara’s recent event series where the duo curates exhibitions to experiment with ideas and collaborate with artists, working with them to define pieces which capture MalaCara’s philosophy. The series exists to help artists gain confidence in the artistic process and step outside their comfort zone.

They were curious to intertwine food and community, and had conceptualized an edible chair and table. The duo reached out to Majo after discovering her culinary work. She agreed to the collaboration immediately.

Majo’s childhood in Guadalajara was accompanied by rich and intentional flavors; coupled with her Lebanese grandmother, food was ubiquitous. Smiling, she reflects on the similarities between a Lebanese and a Mexican family, “Food brings everyone to the table.”

For Majo, however, food is more than a social unifier. It’s an emotional experience. 

“When I cook something, I'm trying to look for the reaction of people,” Majo shares. 

“When people try my food and they’re like” — Majo widens her eyes and raises her eyebrows to emote an emphatic wow — “It fills my heart.”

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For Majo, however, food is more than a social unifier. It’s an emotional experience.

“When I cook something, I'm trying to look for the reaction of people,” Majo shares.

“When people try my food and they’re like” — Majo widens her eyes and raises her eyebrows to emote an emphatic wow — “It fills my heart.”

“Art is similar in that way,” Majo begins. “When a piece makes you feel emotional, it's a great piece.”

Majo was ardent about nonpretentious art experiences. She wanted to give attendees the chance to strike up a conversation about art and her piece in a manner reminiscent of the silly conversations you might engage your family or friends in—those conversations around the table where you laugh, talk about life, and chit chat.

Chef and Artist Majo created Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2 for MalaCara’s second edition of Playground. It’s an artistic exploration rooted in ‘play.’ Surrealist in nature, her pieces excavate buried emotions and memories. Their beauty and humour challenge how observers engage with art (and prove destroying edible furniture is beloved by all).

The ubiquitous bread was the obvious choice of medium for Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2. Majo explains that, “Being able to take a piece [of bread] and share it with the people around you at a table is an ordinary act. Art, on the other hand, is something a bit more rigid.” She feels, “Sometimes people are scared to go to a museum and talk about [art].” But you needn’t be familiar with the Western art canon to consume Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2. Majo’s art pieces decisively marry the two opposing cultural objects, art and bread, to make art digestible by everyone.

Majo felt especially compelled to be inclusive with her feature in Playground as a response to her own hardships as a woman in the food industry. During our conversation, Majo addressed the solemn reality that the industry is patriarchal and sexual misconduct and abuse is common. Physically intimate kitchens can masquerade inappropriate touching as inevitable physical touch. It’s common for men to squeeze behind women and call out “I’m hot” with a warm pan overhead while brushing the back of female colleagues. Majo recalls thinking to herself, “I don't want to work in a kitchen. I don't want to live in a world like this.”

Then, one chef showed her it was possible to create an inclusive kitchen where people’s bodies and minds are respected. Empowered by the intentionality and respect practiced in this particular kitchen, she felt energized. Majo started to define her own work. Creating feminine spaces, characterized by their inclusivity, became an act of joy and pride for Majo.

Playground, Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2 required a village. MalaCara helped to identify two pieces of furniture that would be displayed at the exhibition. A local collector from the vintage bazaar El Trocadero helped Majo in selecting the actual pieces themselves. Two sourdough bakers, Luciana and Lety, from La Boutique del Tigro lent Majo their kitchen, industrial ovens, and dough.

When the day of Majo’s art debut arrived, there wasn’t time to be nervous—and no need. She felt free to experiment. “With patience and good background music,” Majo began weaving ropes of dough, attaching bread to wood, and crafting the peculiar from the familiar.

Majo’s Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2 tastefully explore emotion and conversation by embracing food as a medium of art and eliciting visceral reactions.

The chair is a charming companion. Or, perhaps it’s the other way around. Perhaps the chair, with its nailed-in-place sourdough backrest, two feet, and ten toes, believes the table is its companion.

I have the freedom to move where I please, the chair suggests.

Playground attendees can’t help but giggle at the furniture duo. Unostentatious in style, Majo’s surrealism transcends the confines of language.

A true work of art, and quasi-edible, people were unsure on how to properly engage with the art. Majo takes pride in “creat[ing] doubt about how to interact with the work—to have that fear of being able to ‘undo’ a piece and still enjoy it.” Majo elaborates,“What I liked the most was hearing the dialogue that existed between the people—the ability to question whether what they were doing was right or wrong.”

You had to test boundaries to digest the artwork; the installation forced people to reckon with their own assumptions. Pinching off parts of the chair’s glutinous backrest or the table’s bouncy rolls of bread was participatory in nature.

Edible furniture? A child’s wildest fantasy. And to destroy such a creation of beauty—how amusing! With full plates and smiles, people sat down to amuse, collectively, in the matters of a humble chair and table.

Majo and MalaCara’s art disrupted the social order.

Or better yet, it bore a return to an original order—one which preceded the imposition of notions and language that adulthood brings. Playground brings us back to a time before decorating the walls with crayons warranted a scolding. Naivete and mischief was abundant, and it was glorious. On the playground, we swung. We made unlikely friends. And when the colorful metal beams no longer could accommodate our wildest pursuits, we took it upon ourselves to create games of our own.

A sensory and social exploration, Nostalgia Part 1 and Part 2 encourages us to tear down rules to build our own world. A world of edible tables. A world that demands curiosity and conversation and change.

“Playground, it’s something fun and for everyone,” Majo elates. “You break a little piece and you share it.”

A flat bouquet of bread rolls creates a table top, assuming the duty of that of a pin cushion. A fastened burlap cloth and needle dangle from the table’s surface and a cream ball of yarn rests softly above.

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