Existentialism for Dinner
Marina Kozak and Peter Diamond discuss reviving their existentialist dinner party series, Shrub Society, in 2020’s surreal landscape.
Words by Clare Kemmerer
Marina Kozak and Peter Diamond are childhood friends and interdisciplinary artists. Several years ago, they founded the existential-surrealist dinner party series “The Shrub Society.” Kozak is a multidisciplinary artist who focuses on graphic and environmental design. Diamond is an experiential strategist working at an advertising agency. After a hiatus, they’re thinking of bringing The Shrub Society back and reconnecting with the existential absurd.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Would you mind describing for me what Shrub Society is and how it came about?
P: Shrub society is a supper club—I think that would be the easiest way to describe it. We created it with the intention of making a space where people could connect with one another. I had just graduated college, and especially in the queer community, I was having difficulty forming personal connections or meeting people in real life. So we wanted to create a space where we could connect our friends or help our friends meet other people in our community, using a party or an event. Marina and I grew up across the street from one another. We’d been friends through all of college, and we both had a lot of varied interests—different design elements, fabrication, things like that. We wanted a way for us to explore different kinds of aesthetics and structures.
It ended up as a collective between Marina and I. Marina was doing a lot of the creative design and fabrication. At that point, I was really interested in mixology. I was doing cocktails and my friend and roommate was the chef because he was interning at a butcher shop/restaurant in Chicago. It was another way for him to build his portfolio. So, it was a kind of two-pronged project: a way for us to do something fun and hands-on, but also for people to connect and meet new friends.
How would you summarize the experience of attending a Shrub party?
P: One of the defining things that we focused on was the kind of friction that happens at dinner parties for someone who might have social anxiety over just starting a conversation. We'd attended other dinner parties in Chicago where you were sitting next to someone, and there was never an opportunity to start a conversation except “pass the bread.” We wanted both the theme and the space to be something that could start a conversation, that you could talk about. Something we usually did was have a parlor game. We tried to make it so that you didn't have to divulge personal information about yourself, so it wasn't asking where you're from or what your job is, because those things don't always form the most authentic connections; they form pre-judgments about people.
In one of the games we did, we’d have you find a punchline. We’d split people up, and you’d have a joke and a punchline. But the punchline didn't match your joke. So you'd have to wander around and tell people your joke. And then they would say the punchline. The idea was that two people would have a moment where neither would divulge any personal information, but the barriers would break down, and they could actually connect. The whole point of the event was to make friends.
M: I’m thinking of one that had even less conversation as its basis. We gave everyone a puzzle piece as they came in, and then an hour into the party, you’d find out that there were six puzzles total. And there was a competition for six people to find each other and put together their puzzle first. They could connect without talking, just laughing, because either everything was matching or nothing was.
On Marina’s website, Shrub is described as an “existential surrealist” dinner party. Could you unpack that?
M: The creative impetus behind the theme was that we were in our early 20s. We were all going through what happens as 20-something-year-olds, something you want to talk about and don’t understand—that you come out of college and have an existential crisis trying to figure out what you want to do. We thought it would be a good theme for the party because ideally, it would filter for people who would want to discuss that. We hoped all the guests were going to be interested in existentialism, and that we’d get a bunch of people together and sitting down talking about that.
From an art direction perspective, the bed stone was this idea that you would eat under this giant neon wireframe church, because I think that a very cliche existential crisis is when you leave the religion that you were brought up with, when you leave your upbringing. A lot of times that’s the religion of the church. We’d eat at this long table in a wire-frame church, and the menu was based around things like sweetbreads and cow tongue and insects, things people might not consider food. Every aspect of the party was all about questioning what existence is. What is food? What is humor? What are all the things that we have normalized, how do you deconstruct them? That lends to starting a lot of good conversations between strangers because everyone is equally lost.
Food is the ultimate form of communion, and you all were eating in a neon-frame church. How do you feel that food brings people together? Why did you want to center the community you were building around food?
M: Food to me is one of the easier catalysts. There's always the people who are hanging out at the snack table. It's not performative. You don't have to look cool to eat, there's not a lot of insecurity surrounding it. And [Peter and I] like to dress up. There's something about “Hey, we're having a dinner party.” People dress up, and they indulge a certain level of glamour. We're trying to lean into that also. We didn't want to just throw a rager or a party.
P: To your point of not wanting to throw a rager—I think even a concert where you're distracted by something feels like you're not necessarily forming those personal connections. The emphasis is not on connection, whereas when you're sitting across a long table, it is. The idea is that by doing a game or some sort of icebreaker during the cocktail hour you break down your social inhibition a little bit and form connections with other people. Then when you sit down, you're sitting down with those people, and it's an opportunity to deepen that relationship. With food specifically, I think the idea is a holistic experience where we're appealing to all the senses.
It's also really cool from a music standpoint and from a food and cocktails standpoint to think about how different things influence your flavors. Sometimes when we would come up with our menus, we would write little narratives for each course...It was a little ridiculous. But it was, again, just a fun way to create that holistic and narrative driven kind of experience.
How do you go about discerning what kind of a theme would work for developing conversations and community?
M: [Peter and I] are always riffing. We're always having hypothetical conversations. Just in the process of talking, we're constantly just being like, that. That's a Shrub. We just collect those, and then start to play with which ones are plausible.
P: We wanted them all to feel different, but to also feel unique. I think from the idea perspective, the concept was important, because it's supposed to be a conversational kind of topic. I think existentialism was definitely a through line, or absurdism in some instances. With specific ideas, we picked ones that felt like they used all the senses, that were very vibrant. Now that we’re picking Shrub back up, we’ll be drawing from different experiences, because it’s been a while.
Now that you’re bringing Shrub back, do you still see existentialism as the through line? How do you think existentialism will play into a post-corona party, as we are all coming out of isolation?
P: I think that's definitely something that we'll have to think about. We’re still in the early stages of exploring, and there are so many unknowns in terms of when something like this would even be possible. At one point, we talked about doing a remote dinner where you send people a batch cocktail or menu or a space theme where everyone just eats freeze dried food, because that's the only thing we can ship. It's a really interesting time to be creative. I think a lot of people are at the point of having existential crises right now just because we've been spending so much time alone with ourselves, staring at the walls. I think we'll have to lean into that. But that's the area that we like to explore anyway.
M: I was having a conversation with another fabricator about how the entertainment industry is going to change in general. And we think events moving forward are gonna have to be really thoughtful and carry a lot of weight emotionally, because it really has to be worth leaving your house and potentially putting yourself at risk. Leaning into that, we’re going to accommodate existential crises. I think it's going to be something where not only does the theme have to line up with all these physical limitations, but we always write narratives first for parties. I think it will be important to write a narrative that resonates like on a much deeper level, one that is still absurd but has people walking away feeling moved.
You’ve both worked in a variety of artistic disciplines since founding Shrub. How do you anticipate your other work influencing the Shrub revival?
M: When we started doing this, I was in graphic design and product design. Since then I've worked in a series of experiential spaces. Now, I work for music festivals like Pitchfork, so I'm much more conscious of how to layout the spaces better, especially how to make things accessible. Mostly, the physicality will change, because I’m more aware. We’ve both been simultaneously working in digital marketing and advertising spaces, shaping how we approach the message. It’s mostly business stuff that’ll change for us.
P: I think one of the drives of the project is to do something really tangible and real. It plays into a desire a lot of us have to do something physical, because so much of our lives are abstract and on the screen. That aspect is very satisfying for me to work on. I've always been interested in writing and narratives, which has developed with my work. I think one thing that we did really well and that we'll probably still try to look at is having a lot of empathy for people who are socially awkward at parties. I always try to look for those moments when we can break down those barriers, because that was the original intent. I want the different components to flow together so it feels like you're part of a narrative, brought from one place to another.
This is a question out of sheer curiosity—why Shrub Society? Who named it?
P: I think at the time of what it originally came from was the physical word—I had made a shrub, which is a vinegar-based fruit concoction for cocktails. But Marina has a much better explanation.
M: The spark of this idea was that we both have these day jobs, and we really wanted to do things that our day jobs weren’t fulfilling. Then, there was also this group called Spring Street society that was one of the first big groups that was doing underground slipper clubs. We were just these amateurs flying by the seat of our pants, wanting to throw this party. Then Spring Street had this very flowery basic bitch vibe. I was like, no, we're not going to be that, we're going to be that. We’re going to be a shrub: we're self-deprecating. We're just a little plant. And there's no subtext. There was just no ego behind Shrub, and that's what we want in life.
What are you really excited about as you’re revisiting this, [Shrub] as a concept?
M: I think we just have all these great ideas and nowhere for them to live. This was a passion project. I’m excited to do something just for the ideas.
P: There's something so satisfying about having people over and meeting people and eating. Like you said, the communion aspect of eating is so satisfying and so human, especially in quarantine. I've been quarantined alone in my apartment all through March in New York, and New York is obviously crazy. I’m so looking forward to working more on this, getting back to that idea of connecting with people over something like that—obviously when it's safe and it's when we're able to do that. There's nothing like the relief after you throw a party, and you're doing the dishes afterwards, and you're thinking, “Well, that was so pleasant, it went really well.” And everyone had a good time—it’s a very wholesome feeling, feeding your friends and having them have a good time. Then, hopefully, we’ve fostered those connections with people as well.
Do you have a moment from a past Shrub that you revisit as something particularly special?
P: After our post-apocalyptic party, almost everyone had left, and it was me and Marina and maybe a few other people. We had done the event in this strange space. It was red-lit, and we just started blasting music and dancing on the table, just celebrating that it was over, because we'd been preparing for so long. It was just a sense of relief, I guess, but also a kind of high that you feel when you're done with what you need to do. We just had a really great night. So, we danced on the tables.
M: I was thinking of the same exact thing. Pretty much my favorite moment of all the parties are those moments after, where we just get a handful of people who are leftover because the conversation is so great, a nice trickle off from the party. It's just you and a few people cleaning up, and you're looking at the aftermath and you're like, “Oh my God.” You can tell by the chaos that's leftover, like this was a great party. We did a good job. We can go to bed.
In quarantine, what has been sustaining you—as artists, as people?
M: I'm a real textbook introvert. For the first few months of quarantine, I think I saw two people, even over Zoom. I didn't want to see anybody. I was truly isolated. That’s what has been sustaining for me, having space for a lot of personal projects and to kind of fool around with different mediums. That’s how we ended up reviving this. I was sewing and I was doing printmaking and dyeing, and playing guitar. It's just having a literal, endless slew of little projects to work on that are ultimately informing a bigger set of narratives has been really fun, because there is so much extra time. I'm a Capricorn, and it was great to have so much extra time, because I could do these projects and not worry that there needed to be an end game, or that I needed to justify it.
P: I live in a very small apartment. I've been reading, mostly. When I think back on this time, I’ll remember reading a ton, because I’ve been alone. That’s probably why I've been writing a lot more and thinking about the narrative aspects of running a party or designing an experience where you want to feel like you’re part of a story. But the only thing that I feel like really breaks down the four walls around me is reading.
What are you most excited to do when we can all go outside again? And, because we’ve talked so much about dinner, what are you most excited to eat?
P: What I'm most excited to do is to eat. I miss eating at restaurants and getting cocktails and things like that. As much as I have definitely gotten better at cooking while I’ve been in quarantine, I will say that I'm still nowhere near as good as most of the people who are cooking professionally in New York. So yeah, I definitely want to eat. And I think what I'm most excited to eat is—I've been on a pizza brigade, since I entered quarantine. Everyone was making sourdough and I was making pizza, but there's nothing to replicate wood fire pizza. My little oven only goes up to 500 degrees. So, I think the thing I'm most excited to eat is that, hot out of the oven.
M: I really miss concerts. Especially when I was doing a lot of protesting, I was getting concert vibes from the protest vibes, because as an introvert I still missed being around people. At those sorts of things—concerts, protests—you’re standing there with people, but you’re all focused on the same thing. The closest thing I got was through a concert in Minecraft. I don't know when exactly that kind of experience is gonna come back. But that is what I'm looking forward to. Foodwise, I’m not really a foodie. I'm a Taurus rising and lover of hot pockets.
Eggs.
P: Marina was not in charge of the food.
