Developed in collaboration with the team of the Vivants restaurant, co-founded by Mounir Creanza, Clémence Bardaine and Jean-Michel Rassinoux, Blanka Major presents, to mark the close of the exhibition Nouvelles saisons, autoportraits d’un territoire, a collective culinary performance in which guests are invited to create an edible landscape.
At the heart of the meal lies a signature sauce made from fresh cheese produced by a local farmer. As the evening unfolds, the sauce evolves. Through stories, ingredients and time, it gradually transforms, building up layers. In the kitchen, the sauce acts as a binding agent: it coats, connects and brings together different elements. In this sense, it can also be understood as a way of linking the ingredients to their wider context: the farm, the landscape, the season and the people who cultivate them.
The sauce becomes a medium through which these different layers circulate and meet.
The portrait of the landscape is only complete once it has been eaten. All that remains are traces: stains, drips and marks on the tablecloth. After a quick rinse, it will be displayed during the final days of the exhibition.
This project forms part of the Ad Hoc Residencies programme organised in collaboration with LINA European Architecture Platform.
Blanka Major is an architect of Hungarian origin, based in Zurich, whose practice explores various formats and scales, ranging from architecture to cooking, as well as writing, research and teaching. Having graduated in art history and architecture from ETH Zurich in 2022, she is a member of ZAS (Zürcher Arbeitsgruppe für Städtebau) and teaches in Alexandre Theriot’s department, where she co-edited Peter Thomann – Hors Piste (gta Verlag, 2025).
Her work is rooted in an attention to everyday life and ways of living together, focusing on the infrastructures and systems that shape domestic life. In particular, she explores food as a spatial and social medium, using the kitchen and mealtimes as tools for research and gathering.
Through performative dinners and installations, she develops experimental formats that examine the relationships between the body, architecture and territory.
Her work has been presented at the Kunsthalle Bern, the Kunsthaus Zürich and the Foodculture Days in Vevey, and operates at the intersection of research, practice and speculative design.
https://www.bmajor.xyz
Vivants is a culinary project created by Mounir Creanza, Clémence Bardaine and Jean-Michel Rassinoux, which brings local producers and consumers together through seasonal, gourmet and environmentally friendly cuisine. The project is based on a charter that supports organic and small-scale farming, promotes authentic produce, preserves biodiversity and encourages short supply chains with transparency and traceability.
Vivants works with committed producers, transforming their produce into simple, creative dishes that reflect the seasons and reduce environmental impact. The project thus seeks to create a direct link between those who cultivate the land and those who enjoy the food.
https://tousvivants.fr