The Semiotics of Food By Gustavo Delao   Food is part of our every day lives and defines our culture and our traditions. Immigrants coming to America define themselves more by their food than by their languages -because in the process of becoming Americans they gradually loose their native language- but they retain their cuisine. What we eat says a great deal about us: what we are, what we think and, in the process defines us as humans beings.   Junk food is sign of American innovation, impatience, and a desire to do things more quickly and more efficient.   Recent research has found that roughly one in every five Americans is now considered obese, the rate has doubled in twenty years. Up to a third of the children under two consumed no fruits or vegetables, according to the survey. And for those who did have a vegetable, french fries were the most common selection for children 15 months and older. More than 60 percent of 12-month-olds had dessert or candy at least once per day, and 16 percent ate a salty snack. Those numbers rose to 70 percent and 27 percent by age 19 months. 30 to 40 percent of the children 15 months and up had a sugary fruit drink each day, and about 10 percent had soda. Each year the average American consumes 150 lbs of sugar and 566 cans of soft drinks “liquid candy". According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, that is equal to “52 teaspoonfuls of added sugars per person per day.” Can you imagine yourself sitting at the kitchen table gobbling 52 teaspoons of white sugar every single day? Well, that’s exactly what most of us are doing without even realizing it. Junk food consumption has increased drastically in the last few decades. Compared  to 1981, in 2002 the average American consumed in one year: 45 large bags of potato chips - up 78%; 120 orders of French fries - up 130%; 190 candy bars - up 80%; 120 pastries or desserts - up 95%; 150 slices of pizza - up 143%(3)		Junk foods and soft drinks contain dangerous additives, chemicals, and many are laced with excitotoxins found in such ingredients as monosodium glutamate (MSG), aspartame (NutraSweet), cysteine, hydrolyzed protein, and aspartic acid. excitotoxins are substances added to foods and beverages that literally stimulate neurons to death, causing brain damage of varying degrees.   Marketing is a very important component of today's food specially junk food, advertisement is above all a semiotic activity, and semiotics is the theory of how different signs are constituted and classified according to their uses and interpretations. Semiotics assumes a relevant role as a modern society becomes more visually oriented and uses other signs system along with the sign system of verbal language. The sign should be seen as a go-between, as a mediator between the interpreted object and the interpreter. In fact, mediation in this case goes beyond selling and buying. It involves the culture of the product and its relationship to society that makes the product possible or even necessary. It reflects the state of technology, science and design, photography, digital media, printing and communication. It also is a  testimony to the aesthetic taste and the level of civilization achieved and to the interpreter's background and personality. In this sense each time we interpret a sign, we become part of the sign, we give it "life". When we undress the sign of its purpose, the connotation of the sign and the signification of the interpreter change radically. My project consists of the juxtaposition of 2 images, and tries to find the relationship between what we see and what we actually interpret. By using large format printings and making the ingredients conspicuous, I hope to be able to re-signify and de-contextualize all these familiar food and candies. When the viewer becomes aware of this process he will evolve from being a simple spectator to becoming part of the piece and therefore interacting with the piece.