Ten Encounters
curated by Saskia Wilson-Brown
with Olfactory Art Keller
October 9 to November 14, 2021
ABOUT
The art of scent creating is an additive process. One scent is added to another. Once a scent is added, it can’t be removed. If the result is not what the artist has hoped for, the mixture has to be discarded and the artists starts over. There are no scientific principles that govern what happens when a smell is added to another. Painters have color theory to guide them when mixing colors, but scent creators do not have a “smell theory”, they use their intuitions and experiences and go through round after round of trial and error.
In most cases, mixing two smells results in a smell that is somewhere in between the two components or a simple combination of them. However, sometimes scent creators discover that from the mixture of two odors an entirely new odor gestalt emerges. A similar pattern is found when two humans meet. Most encounters leave no trace, some make a person’s day slightly better or worse, but very few have repercussions that shape culture for centuries or even millennia.
For Ten Encounters. ten artists from around the world were invited to explore encounters between two individuals that shaped culture to this day. The exhibiting artists created olfactory interpretations of the meeting of a snake queen and a wood seller, artificial intelligence and the last human on earth, a Dutch trader and a Japanese shogun, and seven other consequential encounters. Using their sense of smell, visitors to the gallery can participate in these important moments of human confluence.
Only 200 milliliters of each of the pieces will be produced to counter the perception of scents as infinitely reproducible, infinitely divisible, fungible commodities and establish works of scent art as unique objects of aesthetic appreciation.
Closing Night
Sat. Nov. 13, 2021
4pm to 8pm ET
25A Henry Street, New York, NY 10002
www.olfactoryartkeller.com
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INTERVIEWS WITH THE ARTISTS: YOUTUBE PLAYLIST
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ARTISTS
Lakenda Wallace (Modern Peasant Beauty)
Oshun and Ogun
Location: Southwestern Nigeria and Benin, 3rd millenia BC
When the Yoruba god of iron Ogún became disgusted with humanity and ran away to the forest, none of the other gods could persuade him to rejoin the world. Without him, all production halted, and humans and Orishas alike began to starve. Oshún decided to step in. She entered the forest dancing with scarves, revealing and hiding her body. When Ogún approached, she smeared his lips with honey. Oshún’s sweetness tempted him out of the forest, and Ogún returned to the city.
Artist Statement:
The scent of Ochun + Ogun’s meeting is passionate—tumbling over the olfactory nerves with herby, floral, menthol, and citrus. The deeper you breathe, the deeper the rapture. Unisex. Ineffable, yet earthy and familiar. Reverently unfolding on the skin with delicate notes of Ochun’s jasmine song—enticing the spirit to follow the nose deeper into the sensual revelation fire in earth meeting water. The creation revealed itself only when I had released the ego, obsessing over how others would react, following the mind down alleys of research and tradition. Once deep in gratitude for the gift and responsibility present in the task, the truth unfolded. In the song of natural scents Agarwood and White Sage create a foundation of resinous wood and sharp green that hold the bass. Sweet, ethereal jasmine, just on the edge of our awareness, flirts for attention, pressing you to bring her closer—a fleeting high C. The sharp citrus of the grapefruit, tying these two forces together—like a chorus of altos.
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Dana El Masri (Jazmin Saraï)
Ahmosi and Amun
Location: Memphis, Egypt, 1507 BC
One evening, Ahmosi was visited by the god Amun, who made himself recognizable by his godly aroma. Upon waking, Ahmosi recognized the God. As the story goes, “his love passed into her limbs, which the fragrance of the god flooded; all his odors were from Punt.” The result of this olfactory union was the conception of the second female Pharaoh, Hatshepsut.
Artist Statement:
Capturing the moment between the god Amun, disguised as Thutmose I (Thutmosis), and Ahmose (Ahmosi) as they unite to create Hatshepsut. A spiritual connection, a moment hidden from the light, only to create light, joined for peace. An ancient chamber flooded with scent, narcotic yet ascendant, invisible yet denotes divine presence. Notes include blue lotus, chamomile, marjoram, black cumin CO2, cinnamon bark CO2, and labdanum.
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Spyros Drosopoulos (Baruti)
Theseus and the Minotaur
Location: Minoan Palace of Knossos, Crete, prior to 6th C BCE
Theseus’ defeat of the minotaur in the labyrinth at Crete was a central story in Greek mythology. The myth details the heroic journey of Theseus, in opposition to the animalic desperation of the minotaur, trapped in his underground labyrinth.
Artist Statement:
Let’s face it, the meeting between Theseus and the Minotaur must not have been a pretty one. Imagine how the Labyrinth must have smelled. A dead place, dark and claustrophobic, where no one ever came out alive and housing a beast. I chose to make this perfume as vile as my ingredients allowed me too, the smell of decay with a bit of an Alpha man masculinity thrown in. I’d like to say “enjoy”, but I don’t think you will.
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Ömer İpekçi (Pekji Perfumes)
Shahmaran and Camasb
Location: Tarsus Province, Turkey, time unknown
After stumbling on a honey filled cave, Camasb, a poor woodseller, followed its source to discover a secret garden with flowers he had never seen before. This is the realm of the snakes, ruled by the snake queen Shahmaran. Bewitched by the beauty of the garden and the queen, he lived there in peace for a time until – missing his family – he asked to leave. Shahmaran granted him his freedom on condition that he tell no one about their world. However, when the king got sick, and at the vizier’s urging, Camasb told of her location, and she was killed. Her corpse, as an ingredient, has three different qualities. Life, death and wisdom.
Artist Statement:
I imagined Shahmaran’s garden not as a superficial object of vanity but as something she painstakingly nurtured into existence in an impossible environment. Medicinal and sacred materials (period and location appropriate) for her alchemy and some flowers both for their beauty and for the production of honey. I composed the scent in the same manner. I arranged the garden first, then the environment around it and finally a touch of beauty. The scene is viewed from the perspective of Camasb gazing at something marvellously alien with a mysterious intention behind it. An olfactory theme song before the entrance of Shahmaran. Notes: Calamus, Perganum Harmala, Galbanum, Myrrh, Peppermint, Mushroom, Honey, Sulfurol, Davana, Rhizanthella Shahmaranis Accord, Stinging Nettle Accord, Cannabis Accord, Rose Isparta
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Niamh O’Connell (Esmerelda Botanicals)
Tristan and Iseult
Location: Ireland and Cornwall, 12th c
Cornish knight Tristan is sent by King Mark to retrieve Irish princess Iseult. On the way home, the two inadvertently consume a love potion, causing them to fall irretrievably in love with one another. Although Iseult marries King Mark, they cannot stop themselves from continuing their adulterous relationship. King Mark, learning of the affair, lays a trap to discover them. When he does, he sentences Iseult to burning and Tristan to the gallows. In some versions of the story, they survive. In most, they do not.
Artist Statement:
Coming soon
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Zhi’ang Chen (Aromatic Aethers)
Admiral Zheng He and the Sultan of Malacca
Location: Malacca (modern day Malaysia), 1405
In the early 15th century, the Emperor of China appointed Admiral Zheng He as an envoy, commanding a majestic fleet of trade ships, to make contact with and establish trade relationships with various kingdoms from South Asia all the way to Africa. In particular, the fleet’s sojourn in the Sultanate of Malacca, an integral part of the Spice Routes, marked the first encounter between Chinese and Malayan heritages. Their confluence eventually produced the rich interwoven tapestry that is the unique Peranakan/Nonya culture, whose influence can be felt in Southeast Asia, including in Singapore, to this day.
Artist Statement:
For this composition, I created an olfactory interpretation of the meeting between the Admiral and the Sultan, with the Admiral presenting chests brimming with patchouli-infused silks as well as fragrant jasmine and osmanthus oolong teas as gifts to the Sultan, and the Sultan offering burlap sacks overflowing with precious cloves and pepper as tribute to the Emperor. This is juxtaposed against notes of sea spray and ambergris representing the Admiral’s lengthy southbound voyage, as well as ylang-ylang and jackfruit – both native to Malacca – to add a uniquely local twist to the composition.
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Maki Ueda (Artist)
Tokugawa Tsunayoshi and Engelbert Kaempfer
Location: Edo, Japan, 1691
Tokugawa Tsunayoshi was one of the shoguns of the Edo period in Japan, and Engelbert Kaempfer stayed in Dejima (Nagasaki) for about two years as a German doctor of the Dutch trading post. During the period of national isolation, the Netherlands was Japan’s only trading partner. The Dutch East India Company brought textiles and fragrance materials from Batavia to Nagasaki. The fragrance materials include agarwood, natural borneol, and cloves: mostly meant for incense. In order to present these goods, Kaempfer met the shogun Tsunayoshi in Edo twice, in 1691 and 1692.
Artist Statement:
Kaempfer was a diligent recorder of his experiences in Japan. When he met Tsunayoshi, he found a shogun that was very curious, and asked many questions. Among them, we see Tsunayoshi asking about medicine in the following exchange:
“What kind of medicine is the best for longevity in Europe?”
“The most recently discovered medicine is the best medicine. It is a kind of alcohol called sal volatire oleosme sylvi.”
The two men shared an insatiable appetite for knowledge and a love of learning. So Kaempfer, in order to accommodate shogun’s curiosity and avoid political complications, did not simply answer “Jenever,” (the origin of Gin), but went to the trouble of using a cryptic name. We can read the “click” of the connection between the two men in their encounter, in this thoughtful conversation.
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Lula Curioca (Lula Curioca Olfactory Studio)
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and the Viceroy Lysi
Location: Mexico City, 1680
The 17th century nun and poet Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz was a forerunner of feminism in Mexico. She dedicated herself to religious life not by divine vocation, but to cover her intellectual need for knowledge. When Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz met the Spanish vicereine of Mexico María Luisa Manrique de Lara y Gonzaga – or Lysi, as she called her – she became her patron and they fell in love. Their mutual devotion was embodied in Mexican literature; intermingling in the texts the life of the convent and palace festivities, which led to the development of a literary body of work of inescapable historical importance in Hispanic and world literature.
Artist Statement:
Sticking your nose into a convent in Mexico during the Baroque period of the 17th century. There, a Mexican nun and a Spanish viceroy are falling in love. Women from two different worlds come together and break with the established. Convent and palace. Religion and eroticism. A love that smells of velvet curtains, incense at mass, nervous sweat, stone-walled cells, piles of books, dust, heavy makeup, dripping candles, brocade dresses, and bodily sexual tension. An addictively human smell from another era.
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Adedognin Abimbola
Fela Kuti and the unknown soldier
Location: Lagos, Nigeria, 1977
In 1977, Fela Kuti and Africa 70 released the album Zombie, which heavily criticized Nigerian soldiers. The album infuriated the government, who raided Kuti’s commune – known as Kalakuta Republic – with 1,000 soldiers. During the raid, Kuti was severely beaten, and his elderly mother, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was fatally injured after being thrown from a top story window. The commune itself was burnt down. The Nigerian government launched a official inquiry into the incident, concluding that the commune had been lit on fire by an “unknown soldier”. As a tribute to his mother, Fela Kuti recorded an album of that name in 1979, which was released in 1981.
Artist Statement:
“Music is the weapon of the future”, said Fela Kuti. For this scent, I chose elements that reflect his music shows: warm skin, fresh sweat from dancing, marijuana. I also chose scents that represent his beliefs about Africa: the wood of the slave ships, the freedom of a return to Africa (with a rich earth sell to represent the African soil). Finally, I represented the actions of the unknown soldier with burning wood, gunpowder, and tears.
With thanks to Anahita Mekanik
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Algorithmic Perfumery
The Last Human on Earth and an AI
Location: Earth, future
It’s the end of the human inhabitation of Earth, and all humans have left the planet, except one. This scent tracks the encounter between the last human, and the AI that humanity left behind.
Artist Statement:
The encounter with the last human on earth leaves an AI alone with its fascination for mankind’s capacity to feel love. The AI tries to crack the algorithm to understand love by scanning the millions of definitions of love it has learned. They all point to the connection between emotions and memory, often triggered by human’s sense of smell. As a final gesture to immortalize its creator, the AI creates a scent that it calculates to be the best definition of love. In the absence of human input to validate the accuracy of its creation, the AI is stuck in an infinite loop of trials. Generation H-1122113 is one of the billions of scent creations awaiting input.
With machine input from Anahita Mekanik, Frederick Duerink.
Photo credit Boet Hehuat
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MORE INFO
Special thanks: Robyn Price, Anahita Mekanik
OLFACTORY ART KELLER (GALLERY)
Olfactory Art Keller seeks to encourage artists to create olfactory art and collectors to collect it. We do this by providing an exhibition space for olfactory objects, experiences, and performances as well as for works of multisensory art in which odor is essential. We also provide technical and logistical support for artists to work with odor and educate collectors about archiving volatile art. Our goal is to popularize olfactory aesthetic experiences in our visuocentric digital world.
Hours: Thursday – Saturday, 12pm – 6pm
Location: 25A Henry Street, New York, NY 10002
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SASKIA WILSON-BROWN (CURATOR)
Saskia Wilson-Brown is the founder and director of the Los Angeles based non-profit The Institute for Art and Olfaction. Her current projects include a radio show called Perfume on the Radio for Lookout FM, finishing a documentary about ownership and historic reconstruction in the field of perfumery, while pursuing a PhD at University College Dublin exploring the shifting relationship between perfume, access and power.
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