The egg, an inspiration for art from Ancient Egypt to Salvador Dalí
The book ‘The Gourmand’s Egg. A Collection of Stories & Recipes’ seeks to place this universal symbol in its rightful place in history
Salvador Dalí painted eggs. So did Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Paul Cézanne. Paul Newman swallowed 50 of them, hard-boiled, in Cool Hand Luke. Alfred Hitchcock thought their white, oval shape was disgusting. Now the book The Gourmand’s Egg. A Collection of Stories & Recipes, which will be published in Spanish in September, reveals how the egg has been an intrinsic element in the history of art, with references even discovered in Ancient Egypt.
For the book’s editor, David Lane, “they hold meaning and metaphor and can represent any emotion. They are recognizable in many physical states: whole, cracked, soft, fried, poached, boiled. They are strong and confident, but also incredibly fragile. They represent birth and new beginnings, but also death,” he tells EL PAÍS via email. The book also includes a collection of recipes to highlight the universality of eggs, in art and in the kitchen.
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