The Perfect Sandwich #3
Interview by David Jenkins
Photography by Thomas Jansen
Thomas Nondh Jansen is a photographer hailing from The Hague in The Netherlands, and he loves to take pictures of all manner of things, but especially food. In April of 2020, Dutch national newspaper de Volkskrant commissioned a series of sandwich-themed photos by Jansen—his response to a brief which focused on design and a sense of playfulness.
How did your sandwich photography project come about?
I was in conversations with the newspaper de Volkskrant, which is one of the biggest newspapers in the Netherlands. The art director Max Siedentopf is someone I have worked with for years on a magazine called Ordinary Magazine, and he was asked to be the one-off art director of de Volkskrant's weekly magazine. He then asked me to collaborate with him. His brief was that the issue was about design, but more specifically the idea that everyone can be a designer, so the emphasis was on fun. He asked me if I wanted to create sandwiches that would be fun for children to recreate, so I had to make something that was funny and that people could do in their own homes.
What was the first practical step you took?
The first thing I did when I got home was Google images of sandwiches to see what other people had already done. One thing I noticed was that, when it comes to sandwich photography, most sandwiches are shot from below, or at a low angle. So you see the filling from the side. Max then said he wanted to see the sandwiches shot from above, so they seem more 2D. Then you just start building. The first few hours were a little frustrating, because I was discovering the limits of what I could do. I do everything in my own kitchen, and my wife was very happy when I eventually cleaned everything up.
I assume you went and bought lots of ingredients for the shoot?
Yes. I went to the supermarket and spent lots of time looking at all the different types of bread. My focus was on color and texture mainly. Then I went to look at all the cheeses, and it was the same: Do I want square or round, and how are these yellowy colors going to look in contrast with the bread. It's a whole process. I ended up with five bags of bread and my wife likes cooking a lot. So we try to avoid wasting food as much as possible. So the next few weeks we were eating bread based recipes like Italian bread soup, bread salad and typical Dutch wentelteefjes (french toast dipped in milk, cinnamon and egg and then baked).
When you were doing research for the project, what kind of tricks did you see?
The first few sandwiches I built did not work, because it wasn't easy enough for other people to make them. They were aesthetically complex and stacked too high with candy and big cuts of sausage. It became too much like a pyramid. But if you start to think of a sandwich from above, then things are a little easier. It becomes more like a painting and less like a sculpture. Most of the time, my work feels a little bit like 3D sculpture, but this was more like painting.
So you really get an idea of the engineering behind sandwiches.
Yes. I have one sandwich which is divided into squares like a noughts and crosses game. I thought it would be nice for people to place that as they're making their sandwich. And I made a sushi sandwich which could incorporate all different kinds of food. And from there, your mind goes crazy.
How many did you end up making overall?
There were five pieces for the magazine, and I created two new ones just last week. I think I made 10 to 15 sandwiches at least. I put a lot of time into it. But it was fun to do.
How did you work with colour?
I really like bright colors. I like to use a flash in my photography, so all the colors are usually very saturated and exaggerated. Most of the time I just want to see some color right in the middle of the image. For this, I tried to create a color scheme for each sandwich.
What would be your perfect sandwich?
My perfect sandwich would focus on bright colors. I would stack several layers of bread (in strange shapes) and color them in some way. I think it would be super fun to have pink cheese, bright purple tomatoes, blue onions and neon yellow sausages. I would also add bright dots or lines on top of the bread. I think it is interesting to create a sandwich without its natural colors. But if it would taste nice I wouldn't know yet.
