Missense
Sean Raspet & Maxwell Williams
November 7 to December 21 2024
Opening Reception on November 7th from 5pm to 8pm
Missense , 2024 (odorous molecules, motion-activated scent diffuser)
Olfactory Art Keller is honored to present Missense is a series of conceptual olfactory works created collaboratively by artists Sean Raspet and Maxwell Williams. In the three new works included in this exhibition the artists examine how genetic variability affects our perception of scent, how novel molecules can be used to create novel scents that have never been perceived before, and how olfactory hallucinations completely subvert scent perception.
The centerpiece of the show is Missense, a fragrance that considers and honors the nose as a corporeal organ that contains variances written in our DNA. The term “missense” describes a type of DNA mutation that results in functionally different proteins. Missense exploits these differences in our odor receptor protein, which result in differences in how a given molecule smells to people. The fragrance is composed exclusively of molecules that bind to odor receptors that varry functionally between people, thereby creating an ambiguous scent that is perceived differntly by each person, depending on their genetic makeup. What Missense smells like to you depends on which genetic variants you carry.
The work was originally presented at the Experimental Scent Summit, hosted by the Institute for Art and Olfaction, in Lisbon, Portugal. Participants at the Summit were asked to smell the fragrance and describe its smell. The results of this research are part of the installation.
In the fragrance industry, the term “captive” refers to a scent molecule that has been created by a fragrance house and has not been released to the public. Until the captive molecule is released, only that fragrance house’s perfumers have access to it and can use it in their perfume creations. The only way for an independent perfumer to make a wholly original perfume is to develop their own novel molecules. For Captive Demo [A1, E12, E34, ZX5] Sean Raspet has done just that and developed four novel molecules, A1, E12, E34, and ZX5. Maxwell Williams used these molecules to create a wholly novel fragrance. It is a scent you have never smelled before.
After taking a hero dose of the psychedelic research drug 2C-B, Maxwell Williams recreated a perfume that Sean Raspet provided in an unlabeled vial without revealing the perfume's identity. The perfume was the original version of ck one formulated in the 1990s and the resulting recreation is CK12CB. 2C-B was developed by the American biochemist Alexander Shulgin, mainly known for introducing MDMA into the realm of psychopharmacology. 2C-B plays a big role in Alexander and Ann Shulgin’s 1991 magnum opus PiHKAL (Phenethylamines I Have Known And Loved) and is known for causing strong olfactory hallucinations which are revealed in the aroma of CK12CB.