Hasta La Ideas

“Chloe,” a 2010 photograph by Dustin Wayne Harris

As we look back upon the month that was, our mouths still water at the thought of “Cake Mixx,” Dustin Wayne Harris‘s recent solo exhibition at Heist Gallery in New York. A recent SVA grad with a taste for delicious detritus, Harris served up photographs of cakes baked by people he dated. The work is bold, festive, moody, and fascinating. One chocolately effort suggests a giant inflatable Oreo, another has the otherworldly glow of a cartoon planet Earth. In a kind of Wayne Thiebaud-meets-Freud epiphany, Harris came to realize that the appearance of the cakes—baked at his request after a first date—would inevitably become a metaphor for the relationship. “Whereas some people consult astrologers, read Tarot cards or tea leaves to predict the future, cakes tell it all,” he said. “Take Chloe for example. You can see from her first cake (above), the relationship had great promise. The second tells you that it ended badly.”

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