by Daniel Eaton.
Artist Jenny Holzer famously once said, “spit all over someone with a mouthful of milk if you want to find out something about their personality fast.”
What is it about milk as a substance that speaks to mistakes? Is its ability to turn and to split, for something pure white to decay into grotesque liquid and its unavoidable dematerialisation? What’s done is done. Can there be comfort in knowing that?
Island Gelato lays still, watching commuters in their frantic hurry. It resides in the city’s ferry terminal, a threshold place of crossing. It is a fast space outside. It is no surprise then that the inside of the store aims to capture a sliver of calm. Gelato, works of art in themselves beacon from within the brightly lit cabinet.
Lime plastered walls, persistently change in its variety of earthly tonnes. A rogue fly or two are glimpsed from behind the till, a faint smell of spilled milk lingers.
Ice cream melts. Waffle cones crack. The idea of spilt milk propels my design documentation. The humorous and slightly awkward social exchange that follows such incidents is unveiled. Is there any use crying over Spilt milk? Coffee too is something particular to individuals, the line of dockets recording orders often misread and consequently misproduced. Milk is literally spilled in a frantic hurry disguised behind calm exteriors. Kids drop gelato from their cones. They cry. It becomes apparent that the gelato store, a social place of eating, connecting and exchanging revels in moments of mishap, imperfect jewels. This is something this book explores and celebrates. Things gone wrong, stains, rips, and simply annoying occurrences of our every day and their effecting awkward social occurrences in space.
Daniel Eaton 