Sissel Tolaas is Baack

From Alice Thorson in The Kansas City Star:

Grand Arts adds an olfactory dimension to September First Fridays with “SmellScape KCK/KCMO (2007-2012),” a new project by Norwegian-born smell artist Sissel Tolaas. Tolaas spent five years collecting smells in the metro area, extracting some from physical objects and capturing ambient scents by means of the same technology used in the perfume industry.

From the movie script for “The Wizard of Osmics.”

Dissolve to Dorothy and Toto walking on a dirt road. They come to a camp with a wagon. There is lettering on the wagon:

PROFESSOR OF INVISIBLE COMMUNICATION

ACCLAIMED BY THE ART JOURNALS OF EUROPE

Let Her Read Your Smell In Her Crystal Head Space Sampler

Also Juggling and Sleight of Hand

MLS—Professor steps down out of wagon—sees Dorothy—speaks to her while moving towards the gas chromatograph.

PROFESSOR
Well, well, well, gallery guests, huh? And who might you be? No, no—now don’t tell me.

MCS—Professor sits by the GC—Dorothy comes forward—they speak.

PROFESSOR
Let’s see—you’re—you’re travelling in disguise. No, that’s not right. I—you’re —you’re going on a visit. No, I’m wrong. That’s...You’re – looking for the smells of Kansas.

DOROTHY
How did you guess?

PROFESSOR
The Professor never guesses—she knows! Now, why are you looking for your own local smells to be captured, reconstituted, and returned to you in microencapsulated form?

DOROTHY
Why—

PROFESSOR
No, no—now don’t tell me. They—they don’t understand you at home. They don’t appreciate you. They want to smell other lands —big cities—big mountains—big oceans—

DOROTHY
Why, it’s just like you could read what was inside of me.

PROFESSOR
Yes—

DOROTHY
Please, Professor, can’t you reduce Kansas City to twenty scratch-and-sniff samples?

PROFESSOR
Well, we—uh,

MCS – Toto pees on a wheel of the wagon

DOROTHY
Oh, Toto, that’s not polite!

MLS—Professor and Dorothy—Toto looking at them— Professor laughs and collects some of the urine in a GC sampling tube.

PROFESSOR
He’s perfectly welcome. It’s his contribution to the fine arts. Here now—let’s see, where were we?

MCS—Professor and Dorothy speak—Professor puts down the urine sample—

PROFESSOR
Oh, yes—you—you wanted to encapsulate Kansas City, huh?

DOROTHY
Nobody cares about olfactory art at home. They wouldn’t even miss it if they all went anosmic.

PROFESSOR
Aw, come, come, come —

DOROTHY
No, they won’t — honestly.

PROFESSOR
Oh—

DOROTHY
Auntie Em even told Bandler Churr to get lost yesterday when he asked for a donation to his perfume exhibit. Please, Professor, why can’t we go with you and put our home town smells in all the Art Journals of Europe?

PROFESSOR
—Yes, well, I—I never do anything without consulting my gas chromatograph first. Let’s . . .

MLS—Professor rises—CAMERA PANS as he and Dorothy cross to right to wagon—

PROFESSOR . . . go inside here—we’ll—Just come along. I’ll show you. There you are—right in there.

MLS—Int. Wagon—Dorothy and Professor come in—CAMERA TRUCKS forward—Professor moves chair up for Dorothy—then lights candles—sits down—puts on turban—speaks to Dorothy who closes her eyes—she takes her basket—looks thru it—takes out a bottle of Eternity by Calvin Klein—

PROFESSOR
That’s right. Here—sit right down here.That’s it. Ha ha! This—this is the same genuine, magic, authentic gas chromatograph used by the fragrance chemists of IFF in the days of Estée Lauder—in which I first analyzed the sweat of fearful men—and so on—and so on. Now, you—you’d better close your eyes, my child, for a moment—in order to be better in tune with the infinite. We—we can’t do these things without . . .

INSERT—CU – bottle of Eternity perfume --

PROFESSOR
. . . reaching out into the . . .

MCU—Professor sniffs at the bottle—

PROFESSOR
. . . eternal. Yes.

MCS—Dorothy and Professor—he puts the perfume bottle on chair—Dorothy opens her eyes —CAMERA TRUCKS forward as Professor leans over the sniff port of the GC—

PROFESSOR
That’s—that’s all right. Now you can open them. We’ll sniff deeply from the GC. Ahh—what’s this I smell? A house—with a Glade® PlugIn ... and Cashmere Woods refill.

CU—Dorothy—Camera shooting past Professor at right f.g.—Dorothy reacts—

PROFESSOR
. . . and a barn—with a weather vane and —and the smell of a—of a pooping horse.

MCU - Professor - Camera shooting past Professor at left f.g. - she leans into GC - speaks -

PROFESSOR
No—it’s—it’s—a pooping pig.

CU—Dorothy—Camera shooting past Professor—

DOROTHY
That’s our farm!

PROFESSOR
Oh—yes.

MCS—Dorothy and Professor –They inhale again from the GC—

PROFESSOR Yes, there’s—there’s a woman—she’s . . . she’s wearing Eternity . . .

MCU—Professor—Camera shooting past Dorothy—

PROFESSOR
. . . her face is careworn, but she recently had her eyelids done.

DOROTHY
Yes . . . That’s Aunt Em.

PROFESSOR
Her—her name is Emily.

DOROTHY
Professor, you’re amazing. How can I help you artistically bring the smells of Kansas City back to the people of Kansas City?

PROFESSOR
Well, I—I can think of something.

DOROTHY
Yes?

PROFESSOR
Run back to the farm and tell Aunt Em to donate a bundle of money to the Kansas City Arts Fund. Make sure she tells them it’s for me . . . er, for the Professor of Invisible Communications and her cutting edge explorations of urban ecology and olfactory ambiance.

DOROTHY
Oh, I will, I will.

MCS—Dorothy and Professor—Dorothy jumps up—picks up her basket—goes to b.g.—

DOROTHY
I have to get back to the farm right now . . .

MCS—Dorothy picks up Toto—CAMERA PANS as she comes forward down steps—she speaks to Toto—reacts—CAMERA PANS left as she runs to b.g.—picks up suitcase—puts Toto to ground—both run up hill in b.g.—wind blowing leaves around—

DOROTHY
Come on, Toto! Goodbye, Professor—and thanks a lot!

MLS—Professor comes out of wagon—CAMERA PANS him left to horse— wind blowing—Professor looks around—starts out left with horse—

PROFESSOR
Better get under cover, Sylvester, there’s a storm blowing up—a whopper, to speak in the vernacular of the peasantry. Poor little kid—I hope she gets home all right.