Fragrant exhibition is a stinker

Novelty smelling art works offends eyes and nose, says Jane Fulcher


Scratch and Sniff Exhibition
Vice Gallery, Leonard St, EC2
Until 22nd March
Free Entry

The hook of this exhibition is that the art works are “scratch and sniff” and will encourage people to interact with art in a new way. Presented by trendy South London freebie Vice Magazine, it claims to feature “the cream of young and not so young artists” from London. These artists have been commissioned by Lynx to represent how fragrance improves attraction.

The problem is that artists have to include a picture of a Lynx can in their work, which essentially transforms the exhibition into an advertisement. It is shocking that a magazine as image conscious as Vice, and 14 artists so obviously in tune with urban trends, would sell their soul to a product as culturally repugnant as Lynx.

As part of the accompanying blurb, the artists were asked 10 short questions. In reply to: “what was your inspiration for this piece?”, one truthful artist replied: “Money”. Another simply said: “Being in this booklet”, and a third, slightly more imaginative answer was: “The finest treasures of the universe”.

These are talented artists, and the pieces by Andy Forshaw, Tim Hill and Ken Chung are particularly striking. Tim Hill’s cartoony, design-led picture seems to be influenced by everyone from Terry Gilliam to Chris Ofili and has the added bonus of not appearing purely as a Lynx advertisement.

It is understandable that young talent should be led by money into such a redundant, vulgar project as a thinly disguised advertising campaign, but that doesn’t stop it from being sad. This project shows that the people behind Lynx think they are connected to Britain’s youth, but the only men buying their products are horny teenagers or people stupid enough to believe their misogynistic television advertisements.

By completely misjudging its demographic, Lynx is set to achieve very little. It is like serving WKD at an ambassador’s reception: so entirely irrelevant that it goes unnoticed.

Apart from anything else, the paintings don’t even smell of anything. Not even after scratching at several of the canvases for a good long while. A gimmick fallen flat. Embarrassing.

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