GEISHA

two parallel olfactory environments inspired by the historical intercourse between Japan and Holland

installation with live performance and intervention (2009)

This work, consisting of two parallel olfactory environments, takes you on a sensory journey to 17th-century Japan when the Dutch were stationed on the artificial island Deshima off the Japanese coast. The scents are not trying to tell you the truth – they take you to the world of imagination and fascination.

(1) ROOM OF GEISHA

This is a room with the Japanese smells that the head of the VOC was presumeably smelling in Japan about 400 years ago.

[PLEASE TOUCH!] You are invited to sniff around and survey the room. Step into the role of the geisha or that of the visiting VOC chief. Lie down on the tatami mats, powder your face and sample the odours of old Japan, smells that were so exotic to the first Dutch visitors.

(2) ROOM OF THE HEAD OF THE DUTCH VOC

This is a room with the Dutch smells: coffee, cigarette, and meat. They were introduced to Japan by the Dutch.

More documentations regarding its development: http://scent-lab.blogspot.com/search/label/%5BGEISHA%5D

ORIGAMI WORKSHOPS

Now and then I give ORIGAMI WORKSHOPS at the art academies. The workshop is intended to give inspirations in relation to e-craft and smart textiles.

2009 @ Willem de Kooning Art Academy (Crsslab)

2012 @ Willem de Kooning Art Academy (Smart Textiles)

cited from: http://wdka2012smarttextiles03.wordpress.com/2012/02/08/origami-workshop-arduino-motor-control/

Origami Workshop and Arduino Motor Control

On 14 February, we’re very lucky to have Maki Ueda join us to show us the basics of paper folding and origami. We’ll also look at different ways that textiles can move, including an introduction to using motors with Arduino.

What we’ll do:

Paper folding and origami workshop with Maki Ueda
A first look at Arduino and motors
Discuss other ways textiles can move

What to bring:

Please bring some paper to fold, plus a different kind of textile for experimentation – fabric, plastic, etc.

Links from Maki:

Inspiration and related links:

Updates:

Ori-Revo: app for making 3D polygons and its author, Jun Mitani
Origami robots!

The video from the lesson is online – you can watch it here.

OLFACTOSCAPE VER. 2

– Deconstructing Chanel No. 5 –

DATE: 15.03.2012 [preimer]
VENUE: V2_ Institute for Unstable Media
CONTEXT: event name: Smell This!

V2’s page on the event Smell This!

OLFACTO (= olfactory) SCAPE (= scenery)

OLFACTOSCAPE is an invisible panorama painting. It’s a 3m diameter space created with a curtain. The walls are “painted” with smells.

Perfume is a composition of multiple ingredients, often more than a hundred. Making a perfume is like making a piece of music: creating a harmony with multiple tones. In this version of the OLFACTOSCAPE, independent components (aromatic ingredients) of Chanel No. 5 are separately placed (sprayed) at the different locations. If you stand in the middle point of the space, you would smell the “harmony.” If you walk along the curtain, you would smell the “individual tones.” The intention is thus, to deconstruct the Chanel No. 5, and to reconstruct it again.

Enter the space, close your eyes, walk and sniff like a dog. Some scents come closer to you, while others fade away. When do you smell the “harmony” and when do you smell the “individual tones?” Do the scents navigate you instead of you navigating yourself? Is there any scent that attracts you, or that makes you want to approach?

This project is supported by Omega Ingredients and inframince.jp.

A multi-sensorial perception of space – ‘Olfactoscape’ by Maki Ueda

A review by Caro Verbeek, an art historian

(cited from http://www.olfactoryart.net/index.php/olfactory-news/14-olfactory-news/109)

‘Because we have two nostrils and because we can move, we are able to perceive smells in stereo and navigate through a space by inhaling’