From fashion to the art world – down to the simple charms of a video of Jell-O being spanked – gelatin is having a moment

For a year now, I’ve been a member of a Facebook group for … gelatin enthusiasts.

Called, amazingly, Show Me Your Aspics (get it?), it’s a haven for about 30,000 fans of fluctuant foodstuffs, often referred to by the brand name “Jell-O” in the US and “jelly” in the UK. Members share photography from retro cookbooks (like this picture of a mutilated sea bass reconstructed with a conga line of gelatin-ensconced shrimp on its back) or jiggle videos of various jellies being spanked with spoons (those are my favorite).

Some of it is appetizing, much of it is emphatically not, but all of it qualifies as “oddly satisfying”, a category of web content that emerged from Reddit in 2013 and encapsulates a variety of quotidian-yet-hypnotic stuff – like watching people cut soap or squeeze slime.

The question of why some people find wobbly Jell-O so appealing is subjective. According to a Facebook post by my fellow group member, University of the Pacific food historian Ken Albala, gelatin’s allure lies in:

“The irresistible jiggle, threatening collapse with every twist and turn. The thrill of the spoon smoothly cleaving its slick glossy flesh. Then in the mouth, that bounce, the subtle firmness that first resists then gently yields to the pressure of the teeth.”

But that’s just one guy’s opinion. For the rest of us, wiggle videos may provide anxiety-reducing ASMR. Philosopher Evan Malone has even made a case for the phenomenon of “odd satisfaction” being a product of the grace of witnessing a “perfect fit”.

What is clear is that jelly’s charms are catching on: lately, the worlds of fashion and art have also been ready for some jelly.

To wit: for SS20, Balenciaga showed three gowns, domed like gelatin molds and bouncing with their wearer’s every step. At Alexander McQueen, Kaia Gerber, her face gleaming with highlighter, wore a petal-like confection evocative of the flowers fluted into 3D jelly cakes (artistic desserts popular in Mexico and Vietnam). At Issey Miyake, dresses horizontally striped with juicy colors descended from the ceiling, pouring over models who jiggled joyfully inside them.

Then there is the contemporary Irish designer Sinéad O’Dwyer, who molds silicone directly on her models, creating vividly colored garments flaunting the suggestive visual metaphor between jelly and flesh.

Gelatin is also relevant to the art world, where its moldability makes it a useful medium for experimentation.

Since 2007, culinary artists Bompas & Parr have been crafting jelly architecture, like a zesty orange version of Buckingham Palace. Their work also inspired photographer Jenny van Sommers to create her mesmerizing The Jelly Film, in which four jellies express their personalities through dance (just watch it).

More recently, as observed in the New York Times Magazine, queer and female artists have drawn upon gelatin’s fleshy sensuality, camp appeal and associations with feminine domesticity to inform their work.

Artist Alison Kuo (another Show Me Your Aspics member) engaged “notions of sacrifice” by manhandling Jell-O in a live performance piece in Manhattan early this year. Artist duo Lazy Mom and photographer Joseph Maida both use gelatin in their jolie laide subversions of Instagram aesthetics. Sharona Franklin, a disabled artist whose sculptures recall her reliance on transgenic medicine, creates found object-filled jellies so eccentrically chic that this week, fashion copycat watchdog Diet Prada posted allegations that Gucci plagiarized her.

Yet what if you cannot reconcile jelly’s growing appeal with its slaughterhouse origins, and are distressed that the worldwide gelatin industry itself is on the rise – estimated to be worth $4bn by 2024?

In that case, consider casting your lot in not with art but science. Synthetic biology startup Geltor aims to have the first lab-grown vegan gelatin to market in 2020.

In search of the optimal wobble, the company used genetically engineered mastodon collagen in its early prototypes.

With growing interest in next-gen gelatins, the appeal of jelly is undoubtedly spreading.