Literature Review

Smell, Art, and Culture:
A Review of the Literature


Introduction

Isn’t gesamtkunstwerk a lovely word? Not only is it great fun to pronounce and spell, but what it means is beautiful – a complete, or total, work of art. Of course, Wagner coined the term to relate to opera, an art form where dance, music, theatre, poetry, narrative, design, and architecture all come together into this great, well, gesamtkunstwerk. But, what does “total” mean? Shouldn’t a “total” work of art completely immerse the senses? Shouldn’t a “total” work of art provide a feast for not only the eyes, but the ears, nose, hands, and mouth? Wagner addressed some of the senses, but he completely forgot the nose. And it isn’t only Wagner who left out our most primitive sense – a century of Western art has almost totally ignored the sense of smell. We live in a world of virtual reality, technology, and experimental art. The shift toward multimedia is prevalent in all aspects of our lives. But still, smell is virtually eliminated from art. It creeps into an occasional science fiction story, or plays around peripheral devices. It runs rampant in commercialism and advertising – the perfume industry is booming, and increasingly more companies are experimenting with smells to tempt consumers. There are scent-related greeting cards, and stickers, and toys. But, where is scent in the serious art world? Why is it not viewed as an integral component of a multimedia experience, or of a multisensory work of art? Why do we stay away from smell?
There are so many aspects of history, art history, civilization, philosophy, sociology, and technology to explore when trying to ascertain how art relates to the sense of smell, and why people typically either laugh at it or avoid it. We need to establish why sensory studies, especially olfaction, are worth investigating at all. We need to explore when and why and how the sense of smell was erased from society as a whole, and what impact that had on the art world. And, we need to closely review the few artists that are exploring olfactory art, to determine why they deem it relevant, what messages they are sending through their art, and whether or not their art is worthy of deeper study and analysis. Finally, we need to examine why scent is viewed the way it is today, and how technology is contributing to or detracting from those views. An authentic “total work of art” should involve as many of our senses as possible – but are we advanced enough technologically to include the sense of smell in our multisensory works? And is scent really important or serious enough to be of use to artists?
My research aims to prove that while many technologies tend to dismiss smell as “vestigial and obsolete”, new media really opens the opportunity for olfaction to be explored more completely, both culturally and in the art world (Drobnick 2006). Technology and cyber-existence have threatened “disembodiment”, but in reality, these virtual environments can provide for new and innovative studies in olfaction.

Overview of the Literature
Research on the sense of smell in culture and art is limited, but there is a real need to broaden our understanding of smell in culture and art in order to direct new technologies. In recent years, really just since the early 1980’s, there has been a shift toward sensory studies by historians, anthropologists, geographers, and literary scholars. In fact, David Howes, one of the leading researchers in sensory studies, calls it a “revolution of the senses” (2006). The revolution, he explains, is fueled by a growing body of research that shows senses are understood differently in different cultures and periods in history (2006). Sensory studies also seem to be a natural progression in postmodern expression, because they represent the tendency to move away from treating elements as physical wholes, and instead treat them as “bundles of interconnected experiences and properties” (Howes, 2006). Studying the senses, according to Howes, “emphasizes the dynamic, relational (intersensory – or multimodal, multimedia) and often conflicted nature of our everyday engagement with the sensuous world” (2007). Naturally, in a society moving increasingly toward virtual reality and multisensory approaches, understanding how humans take in and process information is a worthwhile study, and one of interest to all sorts of research.
Jim Drobnick, editor of The Smell Culture Reader, has a brief review of the literature in his introduction. He declares that the seminal moment for olfactory literature was in 1982, with Alain Corbin’s The Foul and the Fragrant. Published in French, the book focused on scent and everyday life, as well as the influence of scent on major political, social, and cultural events in France during 18th and 19th century modernization. In the world of fiction, the groundbreaker was by German novelist Patrick Suskind, a novel called Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. The novel, about a psychopathic killer with a highly developed sense of smell, sparked much interest in and attention to olfaction in the realm of research, such as Rindisbacher’s The Smell of Books (1992), de Rijke’s Nose Book (2000), Carlisle’s Scents (2004), and Hertel’s Making Sense (2005). Since the field is relatively new, especially in terms of olfaction and technology, almost all of research I found is in the last twenty years. This is relevant because it is only recently that we have even begun to understand how smell works, let alone how it can be incorporated into art and technology. In some areas of research, topics emerge and disappear as time progresses – this is not the case with olfaction, as almost everything is new. I did find one source (1922) that noted that smell is not connected to memory in literature until the 19th century, but this source presented such a primitive understanding of how smell works that I essentially dismissed it, except to demonstrate how “new” our understanding of smell really is. Also unique to smell is its relevance and application in a wide array of fields of study. While I limited my findings to culture and art, Jim Drobnick explains why the topic can be addressed in all sorts of areas. He notes (2006) that smell has the ability to mediate contrasts – object and subject, the material and the physiological, he world and the perceiver, culture and ideology, stimulus and symbol, matter and meaning, material and social, sensation and perception. He explains that attention to scents can make us “rethink the idea of what constitutes culture” (p. 6).
Presentation/Critique of the Literature
As olfaction is applicable to so many areas, and I’m using it to reevaluate what culture means, so many themes in my research are appropriate. Jim Drobnick, Constance Classen, and David Howes, have compiled what seem to be the most comprehensive studies of smell and culture. Drobnick divides his Smell Culture Reader (2006) into seven main sections, though he emphasizes (and I have found this to be true) that “many of the themes and practices concerning scents cross over…categorical divisions” (p. 5). Drobnick’s seven divisions are fear of smell, the spatial roles of smell, scent and identity, perfumery, scent and sexuality, scent and art (including digital media and technology), and scent and spirituality. While all these areas fascinate me, I think that sections III (scent and identity) and VI (scent and art) are most relevant to my interests.
Section III contains five essays on scent and identity. The first is a chapter from Alain Corbin’s The Foul and the Fragrant (1986), which describes the major shift toward deodorization in 18th century France. While the shift was in some ways health-related, Corbin says that it began a new olfactory awareness. This appears to get at the beginnings of cultural interest in smell, at least in Western society. The second and third essay in Drobnick’s book discuss individuals with remarkable capabilities, Helen Keller (1908) and Stephen D., a patient of Dr. Oliver Sacks. Keller titles her essay “Sense and Sensibility”, and in it she argues for the nobility of the sense of smell and offers one of my favorite quotes: “Smell is a potent wizard that transports us a thousand miles and all the years we have ever lived” (p. 181). Sacks chapter from The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (1985) about Stephen D. describes hyperosomia, a heightened sense of smell, and anosmia, the complete loss of smell. While the patients described are anomalies, the essay helps to illustrate the importance of smell to everyday life and how its appreciation can be overlooked until it is absent. I consider an understanding of the contributions smell makes to our lives a critical hurdle in smell’s assimilation into art and culture. The last two essays in this section deal with odor preferences, how nostalgia and science impact the sense of smell. Alan Hirsch offers a survey done in Chicago in 1991, wherein he interviews 1,000 shoppers to determine their connections with smell and memory. He found that people born in different decades have similar feelings about certain smells, for example, those born in the 1920’s have feelings of nostalgia when smelling pine, flowers, and manure, while those born in the 1970’s are partial to baby powder, suntan oil, and felt-tipped pens. I disagree with Hirch’s research, however – I think that while some similarities may emerge based upon what life was like for certain time periods, individual experience is far too varied to make such generalized assumptions about smell and nostalgia. Finally, Rachel Herz’ article (2001) on odor preferences gives me a “quick and dirty” understanding of how smell works, which helps as I’ve been wading through volumes of scientific books with hundreds of pages of explanation. Herz supports my ideas about smell and the individual – she explains that our “specific personal history with specific odors gives them meaning, making them pleasant or unpleasant to us” (p. 190). This raises some questions for me about how olfaction can be used in art, as individual experience has an even more profound impact in relation to scent than visual stimuli.
Section VI of Drobnick’s book reveals how smell has been incorporated into art and technology. I also have found several articles by Drobnick himself (1998, 2007) that review specific examples of olfactory work in contemporary art. From Aileen Gatten’s description of a Japanese incense ceremony, to Drobnick’s discussion of installation works involving cooking ceremonies, to Mark Paterson’s “Digital Scratch and Virtual Sniff”, the section highlights the ideas that while olfactory art is only just emerging, we now have enough fragrant artworks to “conduct investigations into their unique characteristics” (p. 328).
The other major work I have found as I research smell, art, and culture, is Aroma: The Cultural History of Smell by Constance Classen, David Howes and Anthony Synnott. The book, resulting from a research project called “The Varieties of Sensory Experience” based at Concordia University, Montreal from 1988 to 1991, offers “the first comprehensive exploration of the cultural role of odours in Western history”. Topics range from “medieval odors of sanctity to the aroma-therapies of South America, and from olfactory stereotypes of gender and ethnicity in the modern West to the role of smell in postmodernity”. The book will provide critical background I think, to my own conclusions about advancements that can be made in olfaction through contemporary art and technology. A clearer understanding of the history of smell will provide essential building blocks for my investigations into how olfaction can be further assimilated into art and culture.
The mere fact that olfactory research is so new gives evidence of the need for further study. Researchers are only just beginning to connect the culture and history of scent with new media and technology. While Drobnick alludes to many of the possibilities in olfaction, there are very few scholars even remotely aware of how scent contributes to perception, art and culture – and even fewer who are familiar with the various possibilities and methods available through new technologies.
Conclusions
The most critical researchers in the field of olfaction appear to be Jim Drobnick and Constance Classen, as their names emerge again and again. David Howes and Anthony Synnott are also important, though their research is a little broader, related to sensory studies in general rather than the sense of smell. Although these researchers offer critical background for my research, and Drobnick even provides some specific works worthy of investigation, there appears to be no comprehensive study of olfaction and contemporary art.
Each of the researchers I reviewed has major contributions to my studies – Drobnick (2006) describes what he terms “olfactocentrism”, or isolating the sense of smell (3). Immersing ourselves into an olfactory world, Drobnick thinks, will force us to consider how perception and thought change, thereby causing us to “rethink the idea of what constitutes culture” (6). Constance Classen provides a solid background from which to launch my research. A clear understanding of how olfaction has been perceived throughout history, especially in relation to culture and modernism, will demonstrate how scholars and the public might perceive olfactory art and how technology can impact those perceptions.
Although research in olfaction is relatively new, much of what I have found seems relevant and contemporary. I think that olfactory studies are developing quickly as we increase our understanding of perception, technology, and virtual reality. There is very little research at this point about olfaction and technology, because we are still wildly behind in our understanding of how olfaction works and its implications in the world of art and media. While the existing research can provide a framework for my own studies, much of my interests will be new and virtually unexplored territory. In a world that is both heightening and isolating our senses through technology, studies of the implications of sensory awareness, particularly our most primitive sense of smell, are an integral part of understanding our culture.

References
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Carlisle, J. (2004). Common Scents. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Classen, C.,D. Howes & A. Synnott (1994). Aroma: The Cultural History of Smell. New York: Routledge.
Corbin, A. (1986). “The New Calculus of Olfactory Pleasure”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 167-179) Oxford: Berg.
de Rijke, V. (2000). Nose Book, London: Middlesex University Press.
Drobnick, J. (2006). The Smell Culture Reader. Oxford: Berg.
Drobnick, J.. (1986). “Eating Nothing: Cooking Aromas in Art and Culture”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 342-355) Oxford: Berg.
Gatten, A. (1977). “A Wisp of Smoke”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 331-341) Oxford: Berg.
Hertel, R. (2005). Making Scents. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Herz, R. (2001). “I Know What I Like: Understanding Odor Preferences”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 190-203) Oxford: Berg.
Hirsch, A. (1992). “Nostalgia, the Odors of Childhood and Society”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 187-189) Oxford: Berg.
Howes, D. (2006).Charting the Sensorial Revolution. Senses and Society. 1, 113-128.
Howes, D. (2007). Architecture of the Senses. Sense of the City Exhibition Catalog, Retrieved 7 May 2007, from http://www.david-howes.com/senses/Consert-Gaze.htm
Keller, H. (1908). “Sense and Sensibility”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 180-183) Oxford: Berg.
Paterson, M.W.D. (2005). “Digital Scratch and Virtual Sniff: Simulating Scents”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 358-367).
Rindisbacher, H. (1992). The Smell of Books. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Sacks, O. (1985). “The Dog Beneath the Skin”. In Jim Drobnick Ed. The Smell Culture Reader (2006, pp. 184-186) Oxford: Berg.
Suskind, P. trans. J. E. Woods (1986). Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. New York: Pocket.

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