Edible Echoes

Edible Echoes explores how food activates memory—stirring vanished worlds, ancestral voices, and feelings of home. Some tastes soothe, others carry traces of loss. Is there a dish, scent, or flavour that instantly takes you back?

For Studio Herinner, I collected personal food memories: stories, recipes, voice notes, archival images, drawings—fragments that make memory tangible. I also led a workshop with young people from Buddy to Buddy, weaving our stories into a collective tablecloth through painting.

This project explores “re-membering” as an active, sensorial act—bringing the past into the present through the textures, scents, and rituals of food. As Langfield and Maclean write, the senses are “the strongest vessels of memory,” especially in those who have migrated. Practices like cooking and embroidery give meaning to place and home, allowing for both remembering and reimagining.

Edible Echoes was presented as part of the group exhibition Het Geheugen at LocHal in Tilburg, from 3 to 25 May. During the exhibition opening, I facilitated a hands-on workshop and on Liberation Day, 5 May, I spoke at the Vrijheidscollege, alongside Abdulaal Hussein.

Edible Echoes is ongoing, with future workshops and a publication gathering food memories from around the world that speak of displacement, survival, and belonging.