Singaporeans love food, yet excessive salt dulls the palate and masks the true depth of flavour. To inspire healthier habits among young working professionals and students—audiences who respond to digital and experiential engagement—the Health Promotion Board launched The Art of Taste: an experiential generative-art project celebrating the natural flavours hidden in our favourite local dishes.
Using Node.js and TouchDesigner, the team translated flavour components into colour, form, and motion—creating a dynamic, data-driven visual language that reimagined local cuisine through code and sensory design.
This first-of-its-kind experience demonstrated how less salt brings out more richness. By fusing art, technology, and behaviour design, the campaign made sodium reduction tangible, delivering both emotional resonance and measurable public-health impact.
We realised that telling people to “eat less salt” wasn’t enough.
They needed to feel the difference.
Excess sodium doesn’t just affect health — it literally numbs taste buds, dulling the rich, complex flavours that make our local dishes so beloved. What if we could make that invisible effect visible through art and technology?
The Art of Taste transformed flavour into motion and colour, creating a visual language for taste.
Each local dish became a digital artwork — generatively reimagined using the science of flavour balance. By merging art, tech, and behavioural insight, the campaign turned sodium reduction into a sensorial act of rediscovery.
To create the generative engine, we used Node.js and TouchDesigner to translate taste data into movement and colour.
Sweetness, saltiness, sourness, bitterness, and umami were mapped to visual parameters such as hue, rhythm, and speed.
Each dish’s unique flavour profile became a dataset — generating one-of-a-kind evolving visuals.
The installation rendered these visuals in real time, allowing users to see the “hidden” beauty of less salt.
Onground, Singaporeans watched local favourites — like laksa, nasi lemak, and chicken rice — transform into flowing digital canvases.
Each motion pattern told a different flavour story, revealing how reducing salt can bring natural ingredients to life.
Interactive moments allowed visitors to explore how altering sodium levels affected the visual output, turning a health message into a living, dynamic art form.
