The Institute for Art and Olfaction

The Institute for Art and Olfaction (IAO) is a Los Angeles-based nonprofit cultural and educational organization devoted to making scent more accessible as an artistic, technical, historical, and public medium. Founded in October 2012 by Saskia Wilson-Brown, the institute emerged from a perceived lack of transparency and accessibility in the fragrance world. Rather than treating perfume only as a luxury consumer product, the IAO approaches olfaction as a field that can connect art, design, science, history, performance, language, community work, and experimental practice. The organization first opened its experimental studio to the public in downtown Los Angeles in March 2013. It moved to Koreatown in March 2014 and then to Chung King Road in Chinatown in March 2015. Its public-facing work has included perfume-making classes, open workshops, lectures, exhibitions, artist commissions, research programs, public events, and collaborations with museums, universities, laboratories, broadcasters, and independent perfumers. The institute has been described as one of the first West Coast organizations to place perfume within a broader contemporary-arts context. Education and access are central to the IAO's identity. Its programming has sought to welcome artists, designers, filmmakers, students, children, and members of the general public, including people who might not otherwise have access to fragrance materials or professional perfumery knowledge. The institute's approach emphasizes collective learning and experimentation rather than elite expertise or fragrance consumption alone. Its activities have included instruction in raw materials, formula development, scent history, olfactory description, and the relationship between smell and memory, place, identity, and culture. The IAO is also known for the Art and Olfaction Awards, an annual program recognizing independent, artisan, and experimental perfumery. Launched in 2013, with its first awards event held in 2014, the awards have helped provide visibility to smaller perfume makers and unconventional fragrance practices. Events have taken place in Los Angeles and internationally, including at venues and partner institutions in Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Lisbon, and Athens. Its artistic program has ranged from scent-based installations and performances to collaborations involving film, sound, architecture, public art, radio, biotechnology, and space-related research. Projects have included a reinterpretation of an early twentieth-century scent concert, perfumes accompanying billboards across the United States, an installation inspired by UFO-abduction testimony, a renewed exploration of Smell-O-Vision, a scent fair for independent perfumers, and exhibitions exploring mythology through aromatic materials. The institute has worked with organizations including the Hammer Museum, Craft Contemporary, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, Mediamatic, dublab, the Getty-related PST ART program, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in collaborative cultural settings. The IAO Gallery, located within the institute's Chinatown premises, presents visual art, performance, and installation work involving perfume or olfaction. The gallery has hosted artists from the United States and abroad and has also collaborated with Craft Contemporary and guest curators from academic, curatorial, and perfumery communities. In 2021, the institute received a bequest of historic perfumes from collector and writer Conor McTeague. This gift became the foundation of the IAO Collections, an accessible archive containing perfumes, books, paper ephemera, and reference aromatics. The institute has made information about the collection available through a public inventory, extending its mission from teaching and exhibition-making into preservation and research. Alongside programs such as Open Sourcing Smell Culture, the Experimental Scent Summit, and Perfume on the Radio, the collection supports the organization's broader effort to democratize knowledge about scent. The IAO remains an active nonprofit institution rather than a conventional fragrance brand. Its positioning is cultural, educational, and experimental: it provides infrastructure for people to learn about, make, study, exhibit, discuss, and reimagine scent.

The Institute for Art and Olfaction was founded in October 2012 in Los Angeles by Saskia Wilson-Brown. Its creation responded to the limited public access to fragrance education, materials, and industry knowledge. Wilson-Brown positioned the institute as an alternative to the idea that perfumery is inherently elite, creating a place where artists, students, designers, children, and members of the public could learn together. The IAO opened its first experimental studio in downtown Los Angeles in March 2013. It subsequently moved to Koreatown in March 2014 and to Chung King Road in Chinatown in March 2015. These moves accompanied the expansion of its classes, public workshops, exhibitions, and collaborations. The institute became known for placing perfume and olfaction in dialogue with contemporary art rather than limiting them to commercial fragrance culture. Its first major public arts project, A Trip to Japan in Sixteen Minutes, Revisited, was presented at the Hammer Museum in January 2014. The project revisited an unsuccessful early twentieth-century scent-concert concept associated with Sadakichi Hartmann. It combined perfume compositions, a modern scent-diffusion device, sound, live foley, and printed material. This project established a pattern that would recur throughout the IAO's history: the use of scent alongside performance, technology, historical research, and other sensory media. In 2013 the IAO introduced the Art and Olfaction Awards, holding its first ceremony in 2014. The awards became a recurring mechanism for recognizing independent and artisan perfume makers and for giving experimental practices a public platform. Later events were hosted in Los Angeles and at cultural venues in Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Lisbon, and Athens. The organization's collaborative projects have included Zoe Crosher's Manifest Destiny, for which the IAO created iterative perfumes accompanying billboard installations along Interstate 10; Joe Merrell's The Eyes Are Always There, based on scent interpretations of UFO-abduction testimony; and Scent of Mystery, a reworking of the Smell-O-Vision idea presented in the United Kingdom, Denmark, and Los Angeles. Other projects connected scent with speed dating, public murals, radio, printed matter, film, memory, mythology, and independent perfumery. The institute has developed a permanent gallery program within its Chinatown location. The IAO Gallery presents visual, performative, and installation-based works by artists using perfume or olfaction in their practices. Its programming has included artists and collaborators from the United States, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Finland, Greece, Romania, Argentina, and elsewhere. The IAO has also partnered with Craft Contemporary and worked with guest curators, scholars, writers, and perfumers. Public education has remained a central activity. The institute has offered open-session workshops, classes, talks, and collaborative programs with organizations including the Getty Center, Getty Villa, Wallace Collection, Otis College of Art and Design, Henry Art Gallery, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, Fowler Museum at UCLA, Huntington Library and Gardens, Craft Contemporary, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, and Jet Propulsion Laboratory-related cultural programming. In 2018, the institute participated in Amsterdam-based programming with Mediamatic, including Art Olfaction Amsterdam and the Scent Language Hackathon. In 2019–2021 it partnered with GrowGood on Perfume Garden, an aromatic contemplation garden serving the Bell Homeless Shelter in South Los Angeles. In 2020, Van Eyck Reloaded with GLIMPS Biolab produced scent compositions associated with elements of Jan van Eyck's Ghent Altarpiece. The IAO has also pursued infrastructure for scent knowledge. Open Sourcing Smell Culture explores attribution, formula sharing, and alternative models for collaboration in perfumery. Perfume on the Radio, produced with dublab for Lookout FM, extends the institute's educational and cultural work into broadcasting. The Experimental Scent Summit brings together olfactory artists, researchers, and perfumers, with international collaborators including Smell Lab Berlin and Klara Ravat. In 2021, a bequest of historic perfumes from Conor McTeague established the IAO Collections. The archive includes perfumes, books, paper ephemera, and reference aromatics, with a public inventory intended to make the material useful to researchers and newcomers. More recent work has included sensory installations connected with Blended Worlds: Experiments in Interplanetary Imagination and Ether: Aromatic Mythologies at Craft Contemporary. The institute continues to operate as a nonprofit platform for scent education, artistic production, exhibition, research, and public access.

• 2021

  IAO Collections established

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  A bequest of historic perfumes from Conor McTeague becomes the foundation of an accessible scent archive.

• 2020

  Van Eyck Reloaded

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The institute and GLIMPS Biolab create scent compositions related to the Ghent Altarpiece.

• 2018

  Amsterdam programs

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The IAO collaborates with Mediamatic on Art Olfaction Amsterdam and the Scent Language Hackathon.

• 2016

  IAO Gallery establishes an in-house space

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The gallery takes shape in a small room and window-display spaces within the Chinatown institute.

• 2016

  First Biennial Scent Fair

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The first independent-perfumery scent fair is held at the Hammer Museum.

• 2015

  Move to Chinatown

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The IAO moves to its Chung King Road home in Los Angeles Chinatown.

• 2014

  Move to Koreatown and first awards event

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The institute moves to Koreatown and holds the first Art and Olfaction Awards event.

• 2013

  First public studio opens

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  The IAO opens an experimental public studio in downtown Los Angeles.

• 2012

  Institute founded

  [1]The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org

  Saskia Wilson-Brown establishes the Institute for Art and Olfaction in Los Angeles.

Nonprofit cultural institution and educational platform that treats scent as an accessible medium for art, research, public learning, and experimentation.

• Education · 2013

  Perfume education and workshops

  The IAO offers public-facing classes, open sessions, talks, and practical workshops focused on perfume materials, formulation, scent history, olfactory language, and experimental practice. The program is designed to lower barriers to participation and to treat perfumery as a learnable creative discipline rather than an exclusive luxury field.

• Awards program · 2013

  Art and Olfaction Awards

  An annual awards mechanism recognizing independent, artisan, and experimental perfumery. The program provides visibility to smaller makers and unconventional approaches while connecting fragrance practice with a wider cultural and artistic community.

• Exhibition program · 2016

  IAO Gallery

  The institute's gallery presents visual art, performance, and installations that use perfume or olfaction as part of a fine-art practice. Its Chinatown format includes an interior room and street-facing window displays, with programming by artists and guest curators from several countries.

• Archive · 2021

  IAO Collections

  An accessible archive of historic perfumes, books, paper ephemera, and reference aromatics. Established through Conor McTeague's 2021 bequest, the collection supports public learning, research, and preservation of perfume history.

• Conference

  Experimental Scent Summit

  A recurring gathering for olfactory artists, researchers, and perfumers. The summit is organized with international collaborators and provides a forum for discussing creative methods, research, and emerging approaches to scent.

• 2019Perfume Garden

  United States

  A contemplation garden of aromatic plants created with GrowGood for the Bell Homeless Shelter in South Los Angeles.

  Outcome. The project ran from 2019 to 2021 and connected scent, horticulture, contemplation, and community support.

  Source
• 2018Art Olfaction Amsterdam and Scent Language Hackathon

  Netherlands

  A pop-up laboratory and weekend program created with Mediamatic and collaborators including Klara Ravat and Caro Verbeek to explore the relationship between language and smell.

  Outcome. Expanded the institute's international and interdisciplinary programming.

  Source
• 2018Open Sourcing Smell Culture

  International

  A program exploring alternative attribution, formula sharing, and collaborative methods for scent creation and perfumery.

  Outcome. The initiative was designed to produce recommendations and publicly share knowledge about open-source approaches in fragrance.

  Source
• 2016Biennial Scent Fair

  United States

  A three-day fair co-curated with Darin Klein and focused on independent perfumers.

  Outcome. The first edition was held at the Hammer Museum, with later editions at Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles.

  Source
• 201624 Hours / 15 Scents

  United States

  A collaboration with the Pulitzer Arts Foundation and The Firecracker Press translating the olfactory memories of 15 St. Louis residents into scents and a printed folio.

  Outcome. Combined community memory, writing, print, and scent composition.

  Source
• 2015Love Potion No. 9

  United States

  A smell-based speed-dating event developed with artist Bettina Hubby.

  Outcome. Used scent as a social and participatory medium.

  Source
• 2015The Eyes Are Always There

  United States

  An installation by Joe Merrell at Machine Project featuring scents derived from testimony associated with well-known UFO-abduction cases.

  Outcome. Extended the institute's use of scent into speculative narrative and installation art.

  Source
• 2015Little Trees Mural

  United States

  A large mural made from Little Trees air fresheners at The Standard hotel in downtown Los Angeles.

  Outcome. Presented air-freshener culture as a large-scale visual and olfactory artwork.

  Source
• 2015Scent of Mystery

  United Kingdom · Denmark · United States

  A collaborative reimagining of the original Smell-O-Vision film experience.

  Outcome. Screened or presented at venues including the National Media Museum, the Danish Film Institute, and the Arclight Cinerama Dome.

  Source
• 2014A Trip to Japan in Sixteen Minutes, Revisited

  United States

  A Hammer Museum project that revisited Sadakichi Hartmann's early scent-concert concept through perfume compositions, a scent machine, sound, live foley, and printed materials.

  Outcome. Presented as a major early public arts project for the institute.

  Source

Showing the 10 most recent.

• 2021

  Establish an accessible perfume archiveStrategy

  Background

  A bequest of historic perfumes from Conor McTeague created an opportunity to preserve and share fragrance history.

  Action taken

  The IAO organized the gift into the IAO Collections, including perfumes, books, paper ephemera, and reference aromatics.

  Aftermath

  The collection broadened the institute's role from education and exhibition into archival access and research.

  Source

• 2013

  Launch the Art and Olfaction AwardsOther

  Background

  Independent and experimental perfumers had limited visibility compared with large commercial fragrance companies.

  Action taken

  The institute created a recurring awards mechanism celebrating artisan, independent, and experimental perfume practices.

  Aftermath

  The awards became a central part of the institute's public identity and later expanded to international host venues.

  Source

• 2012

  Create an accessible nonprofit scent institutionStrategy

  Background

  The organization was formed in response to perceived barriers around fragrance education, materials, and industry transparency.

  Action taken

  The IAO established public workshops, artistic programming, and educational resources that treated perfumery as an accessible creative practice.

  Aftermath

  The institute developed into a Los Angeles cultural platform with international partnerships and an annual awards program.

  Source

1. 1The Institute for Art and Olfactionen.wikipedia.org
2. 2The Institute for Art and Olfaction official websiteartandolfaction.com