The Netherlands-based, Hong Kong artist shares the Cantonese food she yearns for and where in the city she had a cocktail she'll remember forever
The way we eat and the realities of the food production system are topics that have concerned artist Adelaide Lala Tam and her hard-hitting artworks since she moved to the Netherlands to enrol at the Design Academy Eindhoven in 2015.
“When I started my studies in the Netherlands, I was shocked that my previous life in Hong Kong had such a huge disconnection from food production,” says Tam, whose homeland of Hong Kong claims some of the world’s highest rates of imported food. “In Hong Kong we have a great variety of food coming from all over the world, but how many of us know how those foods are produced?” asks the artist. “Bringing the food production process closer to the urban citizen became the vision for my work."
An early project while studying began because Tam missed beef offal with rice noodles (牛雜湯河). Unable to find it in any of the city’s Chinese restaurants, she decided to make it herself, but even the butchers didn’t carry what she needed. “What the butchers presented to customers was clean-cut meat in perfect sizes and shapes. I was curious––if Dutch people didn't eat organs, then were did they go? It’s such a waste if you slaughter an animal and only eat the meat but not any of the offal.”
A trip to the slaughterhouse followed and Tam discovered where the offal actually went, as well as learning how animals were killed. “I was shocked by the process of slaughtering, but more than that I was ashamed that I didn’t know anything about how an animal transformed into a piece of meat, or how food actually comes to our table.” It was the genesis of what has become her work––an active exploration of food production that has taken her on research trips to Indonesia and Australia as well as across the Netherlands.
One recent project saw her follow the journey of a cow called Romie 18, as Tam shared the story behind the meat and dairy industry as well as Romie 18's own tale––revealing details of the cow's family and her food and medicine intake to her milk production. The work was presented in a variety of ways––through an exhibition, dining event and even cheese production carried out using Romie 18's milk. Tam also documented the project on Instagram.
Tam’s oeuvre contains other food-production related projects and she has won a number of awards for her work. Still currently based in the Netherlands, Tatler Dining caught up with the artist to find out more about another side of food for her––what the cuisine of her homeland means and what she misses most.