May 12 , 2006
Dinner for Two
Jillian McDonald and Beckley Roberts

Description:
Two dinner guests (Carly Busta and John Delk), chosen by lottery, were invited to New General Catalog 224 Gallery. The guests were seated at their own tables facing in opposite directions and separated by a room divider. Through laptops on the tables, the diners were connected virtually via iChatAV. Simultaneously, video cameras captured images of the guests' profiles and sent them to a local web server, reversing the images to create the impression that the guests were seated together at one table. Two performers, dressed as waiters, served a meal consisting of "America's favourite foods", and occasionally offered facts about the food items. During dinner, the guests were photographed by the performers incessantly, and the food items were placed in the window for passersby to examine.Installation:

- 2 table & chair sets, facing away from each other and on either side of a screen that divides the gallery in half.
- each table has a USB or FireWire camera pointing at the seated dinner guest, headphones, and a PowerBook running iChatAV, allowing video chat between the guests.
- 2 additional video cameras, 1 pointing at each guest, filming their profile.
- each PowerBook is running WebCam software, capturing images from the side cameras and uploading them to the local Dinner for 2 web site.
- one PowerBook is running Apache web server and hosting the Dinner for 2 web site. It is also running a browser on its second monitor and displaying the web site.
- a projector is connected to the server PowerBook and projecting the web page on the back wall of the gallery.
- the web page is configured to display the video feeds in reverse position so the guests appear to be facing each other.

Dinner Facts:
- Annual per capita beer consumption in the US: 23.95 gallons. Milwaukee's Best beer is arguably the worst beer Milwaukee produces. From an internet reviewer: "Initially, pretty fizzy/murky/thick tasting. The "Beast" is bad. After only a 3rd into it, it already tastes like a typical warm fizzy brew but its still cold! A fuckin' terrible beer 40oz that yields no buzz. Trying to pound down the swill to get it over with nearly made me puke. Do not waste your $$$. Rating: 1 outta 10 stars."
- The man who invented Miracle Whip sold the recipe to Kraft for $300. Of course, Kraft has since made a bajillion dollars from it.
- Yellow mustard is mainly used in the meat packing industry as an aid to flavor, emulsification, water binding, slicing and texture in hot dogs, bologna and other processed meats. Ground yellow mustard can absorb excess fat and fluid (approximately 4.5 times its own weight) and is also used with seasoned hamburger, meatloaf, liver sausage, chili, various canned meat products, and some table mustards.
- Ronald Reagan's budget director, David Stockman, proposed classifying ketchup as a vegetable as part of Reagan's budget cuts for federally financed school lunch programs (it would make it cheaper to satisfy the requirements on vegetable content of lunches). The suggestion was widely ridiculed and the proposal was killed.
- At one time, Canadian authorities attempted to deter addicts from misusing doses of methadone by packaging it in combination with Tang; this was carried out under the reasoning that nobody would be foolish enough to intravenously inject the combination. This was not the case.
- In 2002 the Federal Trade Commission stopped Wonder Bread from making the false claim that it "helps childrens minds work better." In 2004, the company that makes Wonder Bread, the best-selling bread in America in the 20th century, filed bankruptcy.
- Crisphead lettuce got the name "iceberg" from the way it was transported in the US in the early days in trainwagons covered in crushed ice, making them look like icebergs.
- American "cheese" contains young cheddar as well as scraps, trimmings, and runoff from other cheesemaking processes. Due to its processing and additives, it cannot be legally labeled "cheese" in the US, and so is sold as "cheese food", "cheese spread" or "cheese product". The introduction of American Cheese has, over the last century, caused the US per capita consumption of cheese to increase from 3 pounds a year to 30 pounds a year.
- Bologna is made from almost any part of the carcass, including organ meats, trimmings and end pieces from other meat processing. More than 6 million bologna sandwiches are consumed every day - 67 per second.
- Depending on the area of manufacture, Oreo cookies may or may not be vegan. Over 450 billion Oreo cookies have been sold, making it the best-selling cookie of the 20th century.
- Instant coffee is not considered a dangerous substance; nevertheless its sale and production are regulated. Due to the fact that it was the norm in American homes until the 1980s, some areas of the world see it as a particularly sophisticated beverage. Ironically, instant coffee is the only form of coffee available in certain coffee exporting countries. The lowest quality coffee beans are used and sometimes other unwanted residues from the harvest are the raw material for the production of instant coffee.