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Hungry planet: food for thought

8 november 2007 - Just lay out the contents of your cupboard, refrigerator and cellar on your kitchen table and estimate the quantity of food consumed in your household within a week. No doubt the picture will be vastly different from that for a family living on the other side of the globe. ‘Food for thought’, was the idea developed by the American photo journalist Peter Menzel. For the project ‘Hungry planet: what the world eats’ he photographed thirty families across the globe along with their food for a week.

From a few bags of grain and sorghum (a tropical grain crop) for a refugee family in Chad (weekly budget: 1.23 dollar) to the well-stocked dining table of a German family: the photos show poignant differences. Writer (as well as Menzel’s wife) Faith D’Aluisio noted the accompanying stories and favorite recipes of the families portrayed in the 24 countries that were visited. Add to that the various facts and figures about things like percentages of overweight and numbers of fast food restaurants per country and you get a confrontational book of photos of how the world eats and what there is to be eaten.
The collection of photos that Peter Menzel made for ‘Hungry planet’ forms the exhibition by the same name that will be on show in the hall of the TU/e Hoofdgebouw from 12 November thru Thursday 20 December. This ‘world-encompassing panorama of people and their food’, as Studium Generale describes it, may be viewed every day from 09.00 to 18.00 hours./.

Family in Chad.

Family in Germany. Photos: Peter Menzel