Miriam Chair
www.miriam-chair.com
Sugar Kills
How do Images shape our bodies and behaviour patterns in different spaces? I’m using white sugar as my main material, like images, white sugar is overly processed and lost it’s value since its discovery. It is an unpopular material that is replaced by seemingly better alternatives, like cane sugar, sirup or stevia. There is clearly an impact of sugar and industrialized products on us, causing health problem but the alternatives seem to be rather interested in making profit. I find it interesting that white sugar, from a northern European perspective, is quite regional and only made from one plant without much addition. It’s still seen as unhealthy and just to processed. The same ambivalence is influencing the body image around us, on one side social media platforms are promoting diversity but only within its beauty standards. It is now very popular to change the skinny supermodel norm from the 90s to a “healty” body image. Sugar and certain lifestyles connected to being unhealthy are dismissed. Through my work I want to challenge those perceptions of body images and what is seen as a healthy and wanted behaviour: like sharing healthy food bowls, your yoga trip or only happy moment with others.
The work will be presented in the ‘Gym’ a space that never really served a sportive purpose. It was only obligatory by the government at that point to have a space for physical activity. Now it can be used by anyone for different purposes. I want to use the name of it to re-negotiate different possibilities of the present bodies.
