Categories Pastry Chef Articles
Gabriele Riva. Geometry of form and flavor
His research in fields such as art, science and philosophy, and more specifically architecture and descriptive geometry, opened a new dimension in the design of forms for him. But he also discovered that formal ratios and proportions find an analogy in the construction of flavor, in which their own values and harmonies exist. The aim is the absolute balance between all the elements, forming a whole.
The author of all this hard work of research and reflection is Gabriele Riva, pastry chef and ambassador for Cacao Barry in the United States. Riva presents in these pages a materialization of his theory through Namaste, which he himself explains as ‘the synthesis of geometric studies, composing sculptural and architectural sighting in one complete thought.’
The Geometrical Zen Formalist
Creating new ‘geometric forms’ is an endeavor and preoccupation that has influenced my architectonic sense. By exploring in the realm of geometrical forms I have catalogued new intersections in my sculptural expression.
My studies in ‘visual forms’ with their ratios and proportions have coincided with investigating their ‘flavor’ equivalent. Intersections of flavors have their own values and harmonics. It is not a matter of assigning a flavor to a ‘form’ but the rigorous testing and editing of sensations to experience how they influence the overall ‘sense of delight’. There is now a lexicon of new possibilities, with each ‘element’ or morph geometrically referential to one another and yet harmonically composed in terms of proportion and ratio.
Each element has been actualized independently but when locked into a defined assemblage, becomes a holistic totality in ‘formalism’. I call this making a ‘form sentence’, it is a complete visual grammatical idea. If a legible written sentence has a verb, noun, adjective, to be understood, then a sculpture form(al) sentence requires the same, albeit in a ‘morphological form’.
The Namaste composition represents the synthesis of geometric studies, sculptural composing and architectural sighting in one complete thought.
The resulting expression inherent in my work is a kind of distillation… ideas, flavors, forms, and sensations have been filtered and diffused to their essentiality. It is this quality that renders my creative process in harmony with the sublime nature of Zen. Striking the balance between opposing polarities, then paring them down into absolute clarity and coherence.
The Zen calligrapher sits in absolute stillness as the hand, ink brush and mind waits while meditatively ‘signaling the intention’. This vacuous space for uninterrupted internal reflection is timeless. The rapid ‘movement gesture’ unifies the ‘thought’ and ‘action’ into a painting. It is this tenuous balance of stillness and movement that I have been practicing in my creative work.
Gabriele Riva
Namaste
- sacher sponge
- raspberry & sakura gelée
- saint-domingue cremoso
- chai tea gelato
- kabosu konten
- geometric constituents
Get this recipe at So Good #10
