@FoodLEMology is an Instagram project that combines literature, food and design that investigates Lem’s world through a culinary prism.

The series of posts which will be uploaded on Instagram within the framework of the project will present a collection of recipes gathered from Lem’s works and insights into his personal taste.

The artist Kornelia Bieniewicz created and curated, Zofia Janina Borysewicz designed and Italo Rondinela was the photographer.

Lem was a Polish-Jewish science-fiction writer of worldwide fame. He is considered as the “prophet” of scientific advancement who in his predictions pictured a fictional world which, to a large extent, has become real.

His trail-blazing work is a combination of brilliant ideas, irresistible and somewhat cynical humour and limitless power of imagination.

He was no less a “prophet” with regard to everyday life phenomena. Already in the 50s he anticipated the web, modern genetics, digitalized books and “virtual reality”.

He predicted travel into outer space, the fad of veganism, molecular cuisine and he anticipated the appearance of on-line food photography.  

The following of his books were translated into Hebrew: ‘The Cyberiad”, “The Star Diaries” and “The Futurologist Congress”.

The last of his books that was translated into Hebrew was probably the most famous of his books and, namely, “Solaris”.

It was translated by Dr Aharon Hauptmann and published by Keter Sfarim in 2002.

Most of his books were translated into more than 40 languages and inspired movies such as Arie Folman’s “The Futurologist Congress” (2003) and Steven Soderbergh’s “Solaris” (2002) starring George Clooney.

Background:

Stanislaw Lem was born as the only son of Sabina and Shmuel Lem – a secular, Jewish family from Lviv (today in the Ukraine). In  1940 Lem started studying medicine interrupted by the outbreak of World War II. During the war and the German occupation he managed to conceal his Jewish identity by means of counterfeit documents and he was a member of a resistance movement.

After the war Lem moved to Cracow where he completed his studies at the Jagiellonnian University. He worked as a research assistant at a scientific institute and wrote stories in his leisure time.

At some point of time he received a membership of honour in the Organization of Science-fiction and Phantasy Writers of America. He spent a number of years in Europe and returned to Poland in 1988.

Editorial about the project in the Calcalist