About the Design – Modern Chinese Foodways

Designed and Illustrated by Xiaowei Wu.

My design explores “the canonical” visual presentation of Chinese food: the bird’s eye view of a dining table full of signature dishes from various regional cuisines. Motivated by the conference’s interest in the spatial and temporal continuities and discontinuities marking Chinese food culture, this design focuses on a small slice of modern Chinese food and foodways that have been informed by my own local and personal culinary experiences.

Considering the question “what marks Chinese food as modern,” the illustration stylistically plays with the idea of temporal doubleness. The illustrations show contemporary dishes drawn in the style of baimiao, a traditional Chinese painting technique of solely using thin ink lines without any color or wash, that have been digitally retraced and recolored.