Museums have long sought to engage as many of their patrons' senses as possible. The Odotheka project rounds out that experience by allowing museum goers, not only to see historical artworks, but also to smell them.
The project began in 2021, when the National Museum in Krakow hired Tomasz Sawoszczuk, now Odotheka's lead researcher, to evaluate the air quality inside the glass case holding Leonardo da Vinci's Lady with an Ermine.
"I just thought, okay, I'm one of the few people in the world that can approach the object without any glass, that it will be nice to collect the smell of this painting and bring it out," said Sawoszczuk.
Using advanced measurement equipment--including their noses--Sawoszczuk's team identified the elements making up the scent of Lady with an Ermine, and faithfully replicated it. The entire process took nine months. "We can feel the element of walnut wood, because the walnut board was used as the base of the painting, and the smell of oil paintings," said Sawoszczuk. "It's a very nice, historical museum smell."
The team is aware, however, that scents do change over time, especially for objects that are hundreds of years old: "We are not measuring and recreating the original smell of the objects, because objects have their own history."
Neither will the scents be designed for use as perfumes: the scent of Lady with an Ermine has been preserved in a scented felt-tip pen, which patrons need to sniff only once or twice.
Elżbieta Zygier, chief curator of the National Museum in Krakow, says: "The fragrance is a compilation of information about the painting - its technique, history and conservation materials." Sawoszczuk believes that that the Odotheka project will also make that information more accessible to visually impaired patrons.
Odotheka's library of scents will include the smells of nine more heritage objects, such as the snuffbox of Slovenian poet France Prešeren, and pieces from Alina Szapocznikow's 1972 series, Herbarium. The inspiration for its first scent, Lady with an Ermine, can be seen, and smelled, at the Czartoryski Museum.
