Eve's apple to the Last Supper: picturing food in the Bible

Abstract

There are a huge number of works of art which represent Biblical scenes, and even though only a handful of such pictorial representations show meals or cookery, it is an intriguing visual topic. This splendidly illustrated book deals with about twenty episodes which are relatively frequently chosen as subjects by painters. The emphasis is on the social aspects of eating and discusses both the figures in such scenes, their postures and gestures, and the moral lessons of the text. The actual food is relatively sparsely shown but is nonetheless culturally interesting. The text provides both a detailed commentary on the images themselves and the broader context from which they derive.