Art Info

Guy No. 5,
Sissel Tolaas, 2010

30 ml Paint pot infused with scent from Guy No. 5 (larger sizes available)

Ed. of 10.

Each edition signed by Sissel Tolaas

It's easy to draw allusions between scent artist Sissel Tolaas' latest creation and the fantastical perfume alchemy dreamed up by Patrick Süskind in Perfume. Rather than creating a perfume to mask the scent of a person, Tolaas' scented paint 'Guy No.5' is based on the scent of a person, hence its inclusion in our Inside/Out show earlier this year - the name itself a cheeky echo of Chanel's iconic house scent.

As Tolaas herself states, 'Body odour/smell can provide interesting signs of a specific state of mind and mood. Every human being has a body smell as unique as their fingerprint, BUT we tend to forget this. What could happen if we accepted our own body smell as well as that of the other?' Tolaas here rendered this scent as 'paint' - only touching the painted surface releases the smell.

£100