New Nordic upmarket bistros and the practical configurations of artful dining

This paper analyzes the blurring boundaries between food and art in the West by examining the contemporary field of upmarket dining. The study adopts a practice theoretical view, conceptualizes artful dining as a large-scale cultural formation (?teleoaffective formation?), and explores the configurations of artful dining in the context of New Nordic Upmarket Bistros (NNUBs). Based on blog texts, chef interview and participant observation at a Finnish NNUB, the study demonstrates how the local restaurant enthusiasts adopted and adjusted artful dining in a specific, ?everyday? context of upmarket dining. The study presents dining at NNUBs as one of the many practices that have substantially expanded the art-oriented dining ideals beyond modernist cuisine. It discusses artful dining within the contemporary (gourmet) food culture and encourages further diversification of approaches in studies examining artful dining and the intersection of food and art.