A Meal with Friends 

by Kathryn D’Agostino | Eastern Edge Rogue Gallery | May 23-July 5, 2025

Reviewed by Craig Francis Power

In the relational aesthetics tradition of Rirkrit Tiravanija, whose performance/installation work  Untitled (pad thai), (1990) invited viewers to reconsider their relation to the art object and to the politics of consumption and colonialism more broadly, Kathryn D’Agostino’s exhibition, A Meal with Friends, at Eastern Edge’s rOGUE Galley, presents viewers with an opportunity “to gather together for conversations about community and sustainability” while simultaneously displaying a veritable smorgasbord of felted sculptural objects—everything from olives to baguettes to roasted salmon to seared scallops. Soda pop, and a carafe of wine, complete with ice bucket. As someone completely without friends, I was enticed by the chance for some semblance of a social life.

There’s a giddy kind of thrill in seeing food depicted this way—the objects are so cute and well-made—but also a deeper sense of play and (most appealing for this viewer, at least) of doing something wrong, breaking the rules. To wit: according to my ten-year-old daughter, the desire—if not the actuality—for food fights is still a thing in the cafeterias of our elementary schools, not to mention the impoverished imaginations of our intrepid arts reporter(s). 

Guests are encouraged to touch, pick up, and mess around with the little felted olives and ribbons of red onion, to “serve” the salmon to their friends if they want, to pretend to drink from the wine bottle or what have you, in a way that undermines the well-documented hyper-preciousness of contemporary gallery-spaces more generally. You aren’t usually allowed to touch the art, let alone play with it. However, whereas Tiravanija’s ground-breaking performance forced participants to confront their own privilege as literal consumers of art, D’Agostino’s installation can only present a simulation of same, a representation of those dynamics, fraught as they may be. 

The work therefore would seem to present an almost bleak commentary on the art world and our wider society: that one’s art and/or activism—whatever its medium or cause—may merely gesture toward its stated goals, rather than doing the very hard work of attaining them. I found it jarring and ironic in a way, to be nibbling grapes grown in—I don’t know—Mexico, from Eastern Edge’s opening night snack table, while engaging with my fellow gallery-goers about an exhibition that ostensibly addresses food insecurity. How very powerless I felt, munching away, dabbing my Sobeys pita in a tub of Sobeys hummus. What is to be done?

Maybe the show’s accompanying menu points the way—a screen-printed length of cardstock laid at the dining table, set for four people. Instead of a list of options of meals to be ordered, the starters, main courses, desserts, and sides presented are rather a list of questions for the viewer to consider. Amongst a series of what seem like conversation starters—ice breaker questions for a collection of people who may not know each other very well—is the following: What do you think about the intentional overconsumption of food by the elite? How has inflation impacted your eating habits or community engagement? 

Craig Francis Power is an artist and writer from St. John’s, Newfoundland (Ktaqmkuk). Total
Party Kill, his collection of poetry exploring addiction and sobriety through the imagery of
Dungeons & Dragons, has just been published by Breakwater Books.