Perfume by Jean-Claude Ellena
Author:Jean-Claude Ellena [Ellena, Jean-Claude]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Chapter VI
PERFUME
In Art, everything is a sign.
—P . PICASSO
Every day that I work with perfumes I am in search of beauty, yet I still don’t know where it is to be found. What I know is that in order to enchant you, to charm you, to tempt you, to influence you, to fascinate you, in a word, to win you over, I have to manipulate and make a show of what I know, to make the perfume desirable. Desirable—the adjective that for the classical philosophers marks the limitation of art. However, the fact that perfume evaporates and disappears is proof that it cannot be possessed—desire remains desire.
So it is through the use of memory, through the remembrance of shared fragrances, that I create the seductiveness of perfumes.
Deliberately or spontaneously, beginning in the womb and throughout our lives, we fashion our olfactory memory by repeated acts. As we grow, olfactory memories become part of our emotional life. That is why we like the smell of our children’s skin, our partner, clean towels, a scarf, an old cardigan, nail varnish, buttered toast, jam, coffee, tea, chocolate, vintage wine, almonds, nutmeg, pepper, thyme, rice, Petit Brun, flowers, fruit, honey, lavender, pencils, glue paste, waxed furniture, cut grass, and rain. And why, by contrast, we dislike the smell of unwashed sheets, sour milk, cooked cabbage, garlic, certain paints, stale tobacco, the subway, bleach, blackboard rubbers, cat pee, and wet dog, especially someone else’s dog. And although the difference between a pleasant or unpleasant smell is sometimes simply a matter of personal history, associations with meetings, with happy or painful events, we have common memories that enable us to share emotions.
Since olfactory memory determines our choice of perfumes, for the composer of perfumes our olfactory recollections become objects of desire. Contrary to popular belief, therefore, the sense of smell is not vague and rudimentary, but a complex and accurate faculty, to the point that the brain is able to use a few fragments of olfactory information, conveyed by a handful of molecules, to reconstruct the total image of an odor, provided—of course—that it is remembered. Which is remarkable but also an illusion. The pleasure of the senses is also an intellectual choice.
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