Perfumery: the art and science of smell

Luca Turin was born in Beirut to Italian Argentinian parents. He studied in France and  the UK (Physiology and Biophysics PhD, 1978 University College London) and wrote the first critical guide to perfumes in French in 1992 and a much larger one in  English in 2008 with co-author Tania Sanchez. Turin devised a novel, quantum theory of  how smell works in 1996 and has been working on it ever since. He worked as staff  Scientist with the French CNRS, and as lecturer at UCL. Turin also designed novel aromachemicals for a US molecule discovery company.  He is author of a popular  science book and a collection of essays and lives in Athens, Greece and where he works  at Alexander Fleming Institute as Stavros Niarchos Foundation Researcher.

Saskia Wilson-Brown  co-directed the Silver Lake Film Festival and ran international filmmaker outreach at Al Gore’s Current TV while producing initiatives and media around new models in filmmaking or the arts. In 2012, her interest in transmedia practices led her to create The Institute for Art and Olfaction, a non-profit devoted to experimentation with scent. Through the IAO, she has launched partnerships with institutions such as Goethe Institut, Getty Institute, Danish Film Institute, National Media Museum UK, Hammer Museum, Wallace Collection, and many more. She launched the Art and Olfaction Awards in 2013, an international awards mechanism for independent and experimental perfumers.