The pervasiveness of smell in everyday life is often overlooked. From our natural environment to our urban cities the multitude of odours that waft through the air and stimulate our olfactory senses – our noses, tastebuds and cranial nerve - result in a sensual experience, where pleasant and unpleasant smells are constantly discerned
and contrasted against preferred ‘non-smelling’ ones.

In cities where our relationship to smell is especially thwarted by highly sophisticated methods of washing, filtering, incinerating of odorous discharge and the ever increasing use of personal deodorants and air ‘purifiers’,
the role of smell or questions of its functionality, are characterised by a neutralised environment, keenly negated or masked. In recognition of this longstanding suppression the creation of fragrance – which is also intimately linked with flavours – has thrown our sensitivity of smell into a reductive state.

Sexual attractiveness, supported by pleasure pounding pheromones, is the prima facie result of our odorant-receptor interactions. Why do we have this compulsion
to conceive of smells as being purely pleasurable or not? Perhaps it is the absence of a satisfactory classification scheme, explained by abstract terms and concepts, such as red or blue. In contrast to colours, the classification
of smells is either tied to terms referring to objects or condition. A smell is understood as “lavender rotting”,
for instance, but to smell “open” and “close” becomes entirely baffling.

The work of Nadia Wagner can be characterised as a mixed library of design foundations, formal experiments with skilled perfumers, a broad interest in the urban environment and how the cityscape is conceptualised beyond the dialectic of word and image in contemporary art...