Colors of Perfume

The other day I was reading some discussion on Perfume Posse about attributing colors to fragrances. One commenter decided that Mitsouko, for example, would be a bronzy-greenish gold. This inspired me to think some more about fragrance and imaginary links to color.

I’m studying abstract painting at the moment, and working somewhat reluctantly in acrylic, which is essentially pigment suspended in plastic. All kinds of issues come into play when painters talk about acrylic vs. oil. No one can look down their nose at acrylic like an oil painter, and yet there’s no question that acrylic is the medium of our age -- it’s fast, bright, relatively cheap, dries in minutes, and can be used with hundreds of substances, sold separately of course, to tart it up. But it doesn’t have that seductive linseed oil smell. It’s texture is, well, rather unpleasant; sticky, truth be told. It doesn’t dry with that gorgeous depth (which has something to do with the refractive properties of the oil medium.) But it’s fast. You can dash off a painting in the morning, frame it at lunch and sell it by dinner. Now, if that’s not modern I don’t know what is.

However, I digress.

If your perfumes had a color and -- oh, let’s add one more attribute -- if they were rendered in a paint medium, what would that be? I ran down a mental list of some of my favorites.

Shalimar: “Midnight” blue (Prussian blue) in oil
Bal a Versailles: Coral pink, in oil
Miss Balmain: a rosy amber/copper, in acrylic
Odalisque: Celadon, in watercolor
Amouage Lyric for Women: A deep, copper-tinged rose, in oil
Barbara Bui Le Parfum: A creamy white, in acrylic
Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille: dark brown (what else) in oil
Eau Parfumee au Te Vert: a soft, clear blue green, in watercolor
Rosine Poussiere de Rose: a cool blue-rose, in watercolor
Coty L’Aimant Eau de Toilette: a pinky rose, in oil
Chypre de Coty: dark foresty green, in oil
Chanel Coromandel: deep browny maroon, in oil
L’Air du Desert Marocain: bright golden amber, in oil

Color theory is far from simple; there are numerous color “systems” (roughly one for every painter who writes a how-to-understand-color-book). And pigments, like fragrances, tend to be based on synthetics today, with many of the same issues that fragrances have: the difficult sourcing of natural ingredients, and (not this again!) the fact that some of them can be, well, not exactly safe, like the cadmiums and cobalts. However, unlike the fragrance industry, the art supply industry hasn’t enlisted the help of a watchdog organization to do its nannying. Artists often like the natural pigments because of their working properties; opacity, transparency, tinting strength and so on. The synthetics tend to stomp all over everything else on the palette, so, if you’re using a natural like an umber, you have to use just a tiny bit of most of the synthetics in your mixes; otherwise, you won’t even be able to detect the natural pigment’s influence. So, like a perfumer, a painter not only has to understand the materials, but also the proportions at which they influence each other in varying ways.

What “color” are some of your favorite fragrances?



Image of the Munsell Color System-based color wheel from Wikimedia.

Two Arts

I’m a painter as well as a perfumista. I’m no art-world phenomenon, by any means. I just like to draw and paint, have been schooled, have exhibited some and sold a little.

My grandmother and a noisy and bohemian great-aunt, whom I adored, were artists, too. They worked in watercolor. As I began to paint and study, I very quickly learned that watercolor gets no respect. It’s for amateurs. Old ladies. (Sound familiar?) So, off I veered, into acrylics, then pastel, then oil, where the big boys play. I got reasonably proficient in all of these, and actually got pretty good at drawing the figure (rather useless, here in the Bible belt, where the nude figure is difficult to exhibit. Many shows won’t take them, especially if there is a school nearby, aaarrrgh!) but I digress. Oil and acrylic; you mix and layer, slather it on with a knife. Make that thick, textured surface. Stepping all over yourself; now, that’s the ticket – or it was, when I was learning.

Then, I went through a dry period. A book I read about dealing with such things said, “Return to what you love.” And I realized that what I loved – really loved – was pushing watercolor pigment around on the paper, watching it granulate, running the colors together to make new ones that were layered, not actually mixed, therefore luminous. I began using a pointed brush and working back into the color with water. The paintings were abstract, small and detailed.

I haven’t painted that much this last year; I’ve been busy studying perfume. So, last week, when I began to return to painting, I was surprised to discover that my style has changed. I’m content with “suggest” as opposed to “bludgeon”. As I painted, and the work seemed to paint itself without any conscious help from me (the true joy of this art, IMO) I began to wonder if all I’d learned in the world of scent might be the reason for the difference. That my preferences really have been leaning toward the light-handed, more modern, lately – the Ellenas particularly, but also the simpler Rosines, the best of which have a crystalline quality, and the greens. I didn’t expect this to appear in my painting, but it has.

I think back to all the reading I’ve done on perfumery. Ellena’s work in particular has been described as being very like watercolor. Done with a limited palette. Luminous. Ethereal.

This is something you have to pass through, I guess. From the over- to the understated, which presumes more taste in whoever is viewing (or smelling, or hearing, your work). Which also, of course, consigns you to the cognoscenti, but, hey, aren't we there already?




The watercolor painting, by me, is titled "Interior Landscape, Alaska." All rights reserved.