Public Artwork
Une odeur de luxe
Artwork creator(s):
Lewis, Mark
Text author(s):
Lewis, Mark
Installation year:
1990 Description:
"Odour-spraying" devices were installed in the airport toilets. In the men's room, the devices offered fragrances for women; in the women's room, fragrances for men. Text written in vinyl letters had been glued to the walls and other surfaces. Drawn from the fields of literature, science, psychoanalysis and art, these texts evoked the relationship between the sense of smell and memory, sex, history, gender, etc.
Text of the artwork:
Men's Room:
Breathe into me your perfume and your heat so that my sex will rise clearly out of yours. Your pearl teeth crashed against his with the sound of cymbals and your warm fragrant breath blew around hum like an Italian gale. It was an odor you knew well, exciting, simulating, restlessly sweet ___?___ the odor of a fashionable dance. Des lèvres se posaient sur sa joue sur ses tempes, au coin des lèvres et Hélène fut enveloppée d’une pale vapeur sucrée; elle ferma les yeux. As you lean forward a wait of exertion comes off you sour with use, and also too sweet as if you had borrowed some one else's skin. Tu as l’odeur de luxe: ta peau a le parfum fruité de tussor, le parfum de l’or, tu es désirable.
Woman's Room:
Aspire l’odeur sulfureuse et l’odeur de sein nu de la Voie Lactée la pureté de tes reins ouvrira tes rêves à la chute dans l’espace inconcevable. Together we will wage a perfunctory battle against the outrageous behavior of this place; against turned over slop jar, smacks on the behind, and gusts of sour air. Je me taisais et peu à peu je pressentais la vérité: il respirait voluptueusement comme un encens, l’odeur corrompue du monde. Vous le gueux les immondes les puants paysannes qui descendez nos mornes avec un gosse dans le ventre… Vous tous de la plèbe debout!
Text theme:
Sense of smell
Artwork theme:
Related to the sense of smell
Artist's biography:
Mark Lewis 
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