About the Project

In the virtual Museum of Tastes, the Maribor Regional Museum presents the development, dimensions and importance of taste in shaping individual and social history with the help of exhibited photos of personal items and attached essays about them. By observing objects and perceiving the meanings for their owners, views on past periods are broadened and we are invited to think about what is really important in life.

Taste is the carrier of many precious memories, so the Museum of Taste encourages us to consider to what extent personal objects associate us with something sweet, bitter, sour, salty or spicy in our everyday life or in our past. Currently, six tastes are recognized: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami, and kokumi. For this project, we focused on the first four, opting to exclude the newer and less familiar tastes, umami and kokumi. Instead, we incorporated the sensation of spicy, which, while not classified as a taste in scientific terms, is a distinct sensory experience often perceived as a mild pain on the tongue. 

About the taste

Taste is a sensory function of the central nervous system, commonly perceived as the ability to perceive the characteristics of food. It is closely related to the smell, but also to the touch, texture and appearance of the dish. In a broader sense, taste also means a sense of aesthetics, of what is suitable and harmonious. It speaks of the ability to judge correctly and inspires us in a well-written story, love of music or a provocative work of art.

About objects

Selected objects in the developing Museum of Taste project tell about the associative memories of past events evoked by personal objects. For example: the tea cup that grandma drank from is associated with a sweet taste, because it reminds us of pleasant moments with grandma, or because grandma always sweetened her tea too much and we also drank it like that in our childhood. So objects can associate us with taste either literally or metaphorically.

HOW TO JOIN?

We invite you to summon the muses to the Museum of Taste:

 

  • rethink the tastes in your life - at the table and away from it;

 

  • remember the moments you associate with a certain taste;

 

  • you choose a subject that has special meaning for you;

 

  • take a photo of this selected item;

 

  • write a short composition about the event associated with the object and about the sense of taste that this object awakens in you (1,500-3,000 characters);

 

  • fill out the attached questionnaire;

 

  • submit the filled-in questionnaire, composition and photos via the Upload item button below.

After review by the museum curators, your contribution will be placed in the Museum of Taste.