phenylketonurics: contains phenylalanine

In the spir­it of The Fu­tur­ist Cook­book, Bwargh von Mod­nar and I de­cid­ed to play with wa­ter and flavours. That is, the fake flavours that make up the liq­uid por­tion of the Amer­i­can diet. For art.

We turned our idea into re­fresh­ment for the FLOMM 4.23 event – where­as, par­tic­i­pants were in­vit­ed to en­joy ice cold bot­tled spring water
or
add the colour pow­der (via drink mix sticks) that best fits what they’d like to ex­pe­ri­ence. Writ­ten text ac­com­pa­nied their choices.

What did we learn?

If one for­gets to re­fill the ice chest, peo­ple get annoyed. 

Also: No one re­al­ly likes green wa­ter un­less there’s real veg­gies in­volved. (In Cal­i­for­nia, anyway.)

The favs? ANARAN­JA­DO (we think be­cause of our artist state­ment) and ROJO – or more specif­i­cal­ly, the rather tasty Wal­mart-made Drag­on Fruit Caf­feinat­ed Pow­der we included.

Corol­lary: Ran­dom guy in Dol­lar Store rav­ing about the piss yel­low, off brand drink mix in the cart – ‘Haveya had it be­fore? Haveya?? I lovvvvvvvvvve it!’
 

 

PHENYLKE­TONURICS: CON­TAINS PHENYLALANINE

What does the col­or or­ange taste like?

an in­ter­ac­tive art installation
by
flommists
steve mehal­lo      und      bwargh von modnar

 

artists state­ment

In Amer­i­ca,
our foods are flavoured with chemicals
And vi­su­al­ly, ar­ti­fi­cial colours com­plete the illusion

Then
Re­al­ly cre­ative mar­ket­ing peo­ple come up with names like
CHERRY,
KIWI WATERMELON,
GRAPE
and BLUE RASPBERRY

While none of these in­gre­di­ents are in­volved at all in their production

Well, maybe a lit­tle bit

The poi­so­nous part of peach pits is used to make the ‘NAT­UR­AL FLA­VOR’ chem­i­cal we call ‘STRAW­BER­RY’

The dif­fer­ence be­tween AR­TI­FI­CIAL and NAT­UR­AL FLA­VORS are the sources used to make the chemicals

If the prod­uct says NAT­UR­AL FLA­VOR, it’s just an­oth­er chemical

What the hell is BLUE RASP­BER­RY anyway?

It’s not BLUEBERRY –
cause to­day, BLUE­BER­RIES are made from

HIGH FRUC­TOSE CORN SYRUP
MOD­I­FIED TAPI­O­CA STARCH
and
RED #40
BLUE #01

 

‘This tastes like what CHER­RY should be’
said the Jel­lo people

‘This tastes like what whipped cream should be’
said the Cool Whip people

‘Let’s get an en­tire gen­er­a­tion to eat RED Jel­lo with Cool Whip!’

 

Some adults to­day have nev­er had a Real Orange

But can iden­ti­fy one be­cause of the pho­to on the plas­tic bottle

‘OR­ANGE Soda has no re­la­tion­ship to Real Oranges
But we’ll add flame re­tar­dant to it to make it more juice-like’

‘Add caf­feine and aspartame!
But not too much, so they’ll want more’

Pick your wa­ter                              Add a colour

Be Amer­i­can !!      Be proud !!

 

ROJO
 
Pairs well with Ra­men and Net­flix marathons
Hints of oak, may re­mind of cher­ry, straw­ber­ry, the Tar­get cafeteria

 

AMAR­IL­LO
 
It’s oaky and but­tery with a hint of crushed hope
Tastes like a call from grand­ma in the mid­dle of de­fus­ing a bomb
She wants to know if you’ll fi­nal­ly stop do­ing im­prov and take your life more seriously
You tell her, “Yes, AND …”

 

MORA­DO
 
Re­minds one of wine and Don­ny Osmond
But most­ly wine
Pairs well with the re­al­iza­tion that the 90s were about 20 years ago

 

ANARAN­JA­DO
 
Could be a lot like fruit from the back­yard of a Navy Seal
Sets on the palette like a slur spo­ken in the wrong company
Car­toon ducks don’t wear pants

 

CAFE
 
May be tea, may be lemon
It’s brown
Like the hair
of a beau­ti­ful, bux­om Chérette
who can’t boil water

 

VERDE
 
Tastes like so­lar en­er­gy if so­lar en­er­gy was owned by Justin Bieber
Notes of ptha­lo, cad­mi­um, de­flat­ed bi­cy­cle tire
Pairs well with gas sta­tion croissants

 

AZUL
 
Fruity and dry, like a mu­sic fes­ti­val in the desert
Blue
like ocean,
sky,
like veins in our wrists
Like the col­or of your child­hood bed­room and the sad­ness of leav­ing it behind
Like a toi­let duck in your mouth
IS this water?
When did I lose my shoes?

 

 
 

—steve mehal­lo, bwargh von modnar

Flom­mist Steve Mehal­lo is a graph­ic de­sign­er, il­lus­tra­tor, font de­sign­er, ed­u­ca­tor, food­ie and gad­fly. He is the cre­ator and founder of FLOMM!

Flom­mist Bwargh von Mod­nar is.

Copy­right © 2016 Steve Mehal­lo and Bwargh von Mod­nar. With thanks to Ruby Flo­res, Kel­lie Macauley, Fe­li­cia Czwakiel, and Bill Mead for help with trans­la­tions, foto mo­ment, in­stal­la­tion of our art, and ice.

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