Black Celebration

Black notes in the kitchen. My plates inspired by the music of Depeche Mode.

An editorial and artistic project unique in its kind.

Black Celebration

An editorial and artistic project unique in its kind that is actually a multi-sensory experience, expertly mixes cuisine, photography and music, passing through taste and color.

The idea took shape trying to combine my greatest passions, music and food, in a single project: the goal is to transfer the music mood in the plates and communicate the love for the kitchen with a different language than usual. At that point, paying homage to my favorite group, Depeche Mode, was almost inevitable.

Black Celebration is the only song in the discography of Depeche Mode that gives the title to both a single and the entire album. One exception that inspired me to create this project and could only become the title and the starting point.

Each album, and most of Depeche Mode’s songs, inspired me different suggestions and it reminds me of atmospheres and sensations to create really special recipes and plates.

I have selected my favorite songs for each LP, browsing the entire discography of the band

The result was 17 plates to celebrate their story, from the beginning up to the present day. Seventeen shots highlight, on black, the creative research and my rock approach to the preparation of each plate.

The recipes are prepared with strictly dark ingredients and photographed with strong contrasts between light and shadow, in a celebration of black on black that enhances the textures offered by each plate.

The raw materials were selected after a long research that led me to the discovery of original shapes and flavors, united by the black color. The dark ingredients are the protagonists, as well as the guiding thread of the whole project: I have started to work looking for naturally black raw materials.

Dutch black peppers, black tomatoes, a special variety of corn coming from Chile, lentils, quinoa, Apulian chickpeas, shitake mushrooms, black truffles: starting from these ingredients I created plates that were, at the same time, suitable for a photographic style and characterized by contrasts of light and shadow.

The plates of ‘Black Celebration’ tell a lot about my roots and culinary traditions: I build recipes even according to my memories. In the first course of the series, for example, in addition to rice with cuttlefish ink, I wanted to insert an Apulian Nolche olive wafer: the same ones that my grandmother used to fry when I was small and ate from the bag of bread, as a snack.