‘The Evergreen’: For some Pacific Northwest artists, food and creativity are inseparable

Food is obviously part of our lives every day. We literally need it to survive. But it can also be an art form and serve as creative inspiration. From fifteenth-century still life paintings to pop art, food and art have gone hand in hand for a long time. In this episode, we’ll introduce you to three Pacific Northwest artists whose creativity is inseparable from food.

Julie Beeler is an artist and designer based in Trout Lake, Washington. She makes inks, dyes and watercolor paints from the mushrooms she collects in the forest, and she’s the author of the Mushroom Color Atlas.

Portland photographer Isabella Cassini captures food in a number of different ways — from carefully arranged kaleidoscope images to her dynamic “splashes, crashes and smashes” series. That series is all about capturing messy food in motion — raw eggs, bowls of cereal and milk and plates of spaghetti get thrown in front of the camera as Cassini captures the midair collisions and spectacular spills.

Gena Renaud’s exquisite artwork is actually meant to be eaten. She makes wagashi, or Japanese sweets, meant to be enjoyed as part of a traditional tea ceremony. For most of her career, she was a graphic and industrial designer and worked at companies like Nike and Adidas. Now, she spends time on her meticulous, seasonally-inspired wagashi — delicate, pickled cherry blossoms suspended in wobbly agar, a jelly candy made to look like pieces of sea glass and a confection called manju made with sweet lima bean paste.

Listen to all episodes of The Evergreen podcast here.