Found Scents
Tessa Liebman Donna Lipowitz Hannah Marie Marcus Maddie May Ro Miller
Alessandra Mondin Raewyn Turner Clara Weale Liz Wendelbo Maxwell Williams
RB Wren
at Olfactory Art Keller
May 30 to July 20, 2024
Liz Wendelbo | Excavation IV | 2024 | Assemblage of Francis Kurkdjian edition Papier d’Arménie, vintage vinyl record inner sleeve, laser prints on plastic, screen print on recycled CD sleeve, stitched xerox | 22 1/4 x 9 1/4
Olfactory Art Keller is honored to present Found Scents a survey of scent art using unusual materials ranging from insulin to compost. In visual art, there is a long tradition of using materials that are not normally considered art materials and Found Scents documents the development of such a tradition in olfactory art. Using everyday objects and liquids to create perceptually complex and aesthetically challenging olfactory experiences provides a counterpoint to the long tradition of fetishizing rare and expensive scent materials.
The survey includes the works (all but one new) of eleven artists from the US, UK, and New Zealand.
Alessandra Mondin’s SO CUTE!!! explores and embraces cuteness, its many aesthetic facets, and its cultural and affective dynamics through a blend of cute and readily available commercial perfumes.
Clara Weale’s Insulin highlights the olfactive quality of the life-saving synthetic hormone that is more expensive than many luxury perfumes.
Hannah Marie Marcus’ Mom Objects is comprised of a series of scented objects the artist found and took from her 92 year old mother’s apartment without her mother's knowledge, over a period of 2 months, during the winter/spring of 2024.
Liz Wendelbo’s Excavation IV is an assemblage that illustrates the scent of time and paper through a collection of rare and obscure ephemera that either have a scent to them or alludes to a fragrance or both.
Maddie May’s scrub proposes iconic Dial Gold Soap bars that have been recast to include detritus and display the penal code referencing the Michigan penalty charge for child abuse (750.136b) as complex and weighted symbols of traumatic childhood histories.
Ro Miller's leak highlights the need to expose and consider American social and material infrastructure through a ceiling leak that leaks stale water scented with chlorine tablets.
Maxwell Williams’ Redacted Garden is a tincture of aromatic plants found and surreptitiously taken from a botanical garden.
Raewyn Turner’s Your Name is Like Perfume is a silk handkerchief that has been used to capture the antifreeze, motor oil, brake fluid and transmission fluid from oil slick rainbows in New Zealand.
The tinctures in Tessa Liebman’s Afterparty contain possibilities for transformation, communion, enrichment, encounters, synergy, and future-building unearthed from the hot and sweaty darkness of community compost bins gathered from the five boroughs of NYC.
R.B. Wren’s Slim Pickings blends tinctures created with ingredients sourced from food pantries and soup kitchens in Queens, New York as a representation of the artist’s endeavor to find comfort through food during a period of financial insecurity.
Donna Lipowitz’ Lift to Experience weaves perfume inserts from old magazines to create one singular multi-brand work of residual scent and glossy paper.