In the modern era, this is likely because touch doesn't scale. Think about it: we are all using devices which can replicate sound and visuals. Taste doesn't sca

In the modern era, this is likely because touch doesn't scale. Think about it: we are all using devices which can replicate sound and visuals. Taste doesn't scale via electronic devices, but restaurants and home cooking ingredients are extremely commoditized and widespread. Visuals of food also are extremely popular – think of all the cooking YouTube videos out there. Smell has perfumery, but this is a small thing compared to other art forms. Both food and perfumes also fit well into the market system and have an obvious market incentive for their propagation. Touch-based art forms don't scale electronically (as we lack devices for implementing and sharing different touch sensations) and they don't have an obvious practical art purpose either, in the way that graphic design (for visual art) or music (for sound) does. As a side note, I think touch is probably just as important to food as taste. Otherwise, why not just eat flavored mush? The key word you want to look for on this is haptic art. Here's a good post about this topic, too: https://ivanisakov.medium.com/haptic-art-7f55e995c576 https://ivanisakov.medium.com/haptic-art-7f55e995c576 Edit: I was looking into this more and came across an essay by Johann Herder, which is probably of interest: http://csmt.uchicago.edu/annotations/herder.htm http://csmt.uchicago.edu/annotations/herder.htm https://www.jstor.org/stable/25622078 https://www.jstor.org/stable/25622078 Part One lays out the foundation for Herder’s argument for the virtues of sculpture by distinguishing between seeing and touching. He recounts several stories of blind people who did not understand the concept of seeing to point out the fact that we see sculpture as three dimensional only because we have grown up using our senses of touch and of sight in tandem. Were it not for touch, vision would merely be a field of colors and shapes. In this distinction we find a theme common to media theory, the problem of distinguishing the ways we interact with our surroundings, while at the same time recognizing their interdependence. While Herder realizes that our understanding of sight as forms depends on our sense of touch, he would have us define our understanding of forms only through touch and forget about sight. For him, since the essence of sculpture is "beautiful form and beautiful shape," and a "physically present, tangible truth," (p. 40) to understand it only as a vision is a profanation, a grave underestimation of its potential.