a child shaped log seemed like a good alternative is an ongoing olfactory project. It is an attempt to explore the narrative and space-creating potential of scent, and a work through which I try to reimagine story-making and coexistence in terms of smell.
Using a collected archive of discussions, anecdotes, and narrations, I combine olfactory materials and synthetic scent molecules and employ distillation methods to develop odoriferous liquids based on experiences, impressions, and thoughts shared. Story fragments, fragrant traces, materials, and items are fermented, brewed, liquidated, combined, and placed in blown glass vessels. A series of texts or poems are also written, printed on reclaimed transparent sheets, and stacked one on top of the other.
The title of the project is a reference to Otesánek, a Czech fairy tale, in which a lumberjack removes a baby shaped log from the forest and decides to raise it with his wife as a human baby, after being unable to have a child of their own for a long time. This child shaped log turns out to be an insatiable monster that soon devours them and the whole village. The story draws interesting analogies between the human and the non-human, raises questions concerning need, choice, care, and greed, but also highlights in a way the human tendency for careless extraction and exploitation. These concerns unfolded within the process of developing the project itself, generating a reconsideration of extraction and participation practices intrinsic to the work.
[May 2021 - ongoing]
a child shaped log seemed like a good alternative, 2021-2022, olfactory components (natural and synthetic) in blown glass vessels of various sizes (recycled glass), poems printed on reclaimed transparent sheets (approx. 20 x 28cm)
a child shaped log seemed like a good alternative, 2021-2022, distillation and scent mixing process
[photographic documentation of laboratory process by bmin0r (Giorgos Makris) - special thanks to Tobias Echter for generously providing equipment and thorough advice]