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Trust Art is a social platform that is commissioning
ten public artworks over the next year. People are invited to
become shareholders with $1, share with interested friends, and renew culture.

Perfume Fountain for Humanity

A public project led by artist Anne McClain

Project Proposal

The creation of a perfume begins with a brief. For Anne’s project, that brief is to create a scent based on the experience of an act of humanity.

In September of 2009, Anne will travel to the city of San Miguel de Allende in Mexico with a group of twelve friends and perfumers and spend one week volunteering at the Casa de los Angeles, teaching art and visiting the local botanical garden at a day care center for children of single mothers. This act will serve as a tribute to a friend of Anne’s who volunteered at the Casa de los Angeles in 2003 and wrote of her experience, “I want to work with children..and do something to somehow improve their lives. I know that sometimes that means simply being 'present' to them..sharing a hug, holding them, smiling with them. We don't always have to do the big things to make a difference. If in my time of working with them I can benefit their families and the community in which they live I will be grateful.”

In Grasse, France, the capital of the perfume industry, Anne will create the Humanity scent by combining the techniques of modern perfumery and her studies in aromatherapy. Anne's intention is to use the inherent healing and transformative effects of natural plant materials to create a scent to uplift, encourage relaxation and making connections, stimulate compassion, and nurture a sense of letting go.

The Humanity scent will take the form of a fountain of perfumed water. A place of gathering often found in town squares (in Grasse, a fountain is located in the central square where the daily flower market takes place; in San Miguel de Allende the area where the fountain is located is called El Jardin), the fountain will serve as a place for communing, contemplation, and reflection. The creation of the fountain will be a collaborative effort between Anne, glass artist Alan Iwamura, and industrial designer Lance McGregor.

The fountain will be placed in a public space in New York, acting as a gathering place for people to experience the inspiration and meaning behind Humanity. The fountain is meant to transmit positive energy into the public. The question it will pose is: can good will be spread through scent?

About the Artist

Anne McClain is currently attending the Grasse Institute of Perfumery, taking courses in natural and synthetic raw materials, chemistry, and creation. She studied environmental studies, philosophy, and art at Brown University.

Anne fell into scent as an artistic medium through photography. Anne used photography in the same way she uses scents now - to flatten an experience or memory into something tangible. She also studied aromatherapy to understand the psychological effects the distillation of flowers, resins, barks, peels, leaves and other plant materials have on people.

Anne is passionate about revealing scent's power as artistic medium, and the unparalleled beauty of natural raw materials.

Artist's Past Work







Photography naturally lead Anne to scent artistry. Both mediums lend themselves to the pursuit of trying to capture moments and memories. Anne loves the dreamy, lingering quality that the memory of place can give over time. The excitement and displacement of travel leads one to an experience of being untethered. Anne likes to try and take those feelings, somewhere between illusion and reality, and to condense it, to flatten it, to create something so that she can remember what it feels like, always.




108, 2004
While spending four months living in Nepal, Anne studied with a rinpoche and was initiated into Tibetan Buddhism by a lama. This book recounts some of the insights into her spiritual practice, accompanied by photographs.




Transit/Home, 2005
For a period of a few years Anne travelled incessantly visiting Thailand, Indonesia, Baja California, Japan, and Hawaii, all the while thinking of someone she loved. They circled the globe on different paths, sometimes meeting and sometimes not. They took photographs influenced by each other and collected them into a book.




Kept, 2008
Stemming from her fascination with all things relating to memory, Anne was thinking about the phrase 'a kept woman'. She realized that not only would she most likely be keeping herself, she wanted it that way. At the time she was disappointed in love and conceived of a loverʼs gift to herself. she cut a hole through the center of a book about Paris, writing a story of lost love along the edges. In the void she placed a ring and the book became a jewelry box which she kept for herself.

Perfume - Left
Perfume - Right1

From The Artist

Perfume - Right2

Your Voice

« Day 3 - San Miguel de Allende | Main | Day 1 - San Miguel de Allende »
Wednesday
Sep022009

Day 2 - San Miguel de Allende

Today I started off the day by going to the Charco del Ingenio Botanical Garden with Seema for the 9am tour.  Well, actually it turned out it started at 10am which gave us time for a coffee, which I badly needed and loved having in the morning dew of the garden.

The tour lasted 2 1/2 hours and covered 2 1/2 miles.  Coincidentally, our tour guide, David, was from Brooklyn!  Established in 1991 as a non-profit nature preserve, the park consists of 165 acres, and almost all of the plants which grow there are wild.  There are 200 species of plants, 120 species of butterflies, and 160 different birds.  In 2005, the Dalai Lama visited and declared the park a place of peace.  

The pega ropa flower, which literally translates as "stick to clothing."  It’s flowers and leaves contain tiny little spines which feel just like velcro.

Seema picking from a peruvian pink pepper tree, which can be found all over the region. 

Although the peppers are not widely used in mexican cooking, the oil from the leaves and fruit are used to cleanse and scent the skin.  I tasted the seed and was surprised by it’s lemony-sweet top note.

The plant that has been all over the landscape and cuisine this trip is the nopale cactus.  It’s broad leaves are used in savory dishes (Seema made nopale tacos last night!) and the red fruits, called tuna, taste like a cross between a watermelon and cantaloupe, but more watery.  Mexicans consider this quite a spiritual plant, and it can even be found on their national flag.

After spending the morning at the botanical garden, I was surprised to find that I really missed the kids and could not wait to get back to the center and play with them.  I helped them eat lunch, a handful for sure, and then became their caballito, or little horse, and took turns letting them ride on my back.

The highlight of the day, and surprise, came at the end.  This trip to Mexico has been a lot about being open to possibilities.  Pepe, our new friend in Mexico City, called to say that he had a good friend in San Miguel de Allende who would be interested in the Humanity project, and may be able to connect us with a curandero, or one who heals using traditional medicine from plants.  Jose and I met Jose and Juanita Ramirez and their son Toto at Pollo Feliz for an early dinner, as they were scheduled to drive back to Mexico City where they live.  Juanita was born in San Miguel de Allende and as we told them about the project and our wish to visit with a curandero, they suggested we visit their family ranch outside of town and offered to take us there right then.  We met Juanita’s father Chewy, a true cowboy and owner of the ranch where Juanita was born and raised.  Together we all went on a two hour sunset walk of their sprawling, natural, wild ranch and learned even more about the plants’ healing properties, from the perspective of someone whose knowledge has been handed down over generations, and who still lives in a home with no stove and no electricity.


What I’ve come to learn so far on this trip about compassion has surprised me.  I thought that I would come to Mexico to offer my compassion.  What I have found instead, is that the people I have met on this trip have been far more giving to me.  Both in Mexico City and San Miguel de Allende, people have offered their hospitality, their time, their knowledge, and their help.  They have asked for nothing in return, and what’s even more, I think they have genuinely enjoyed spending their time with us. 

DateSeptember 2, 2009 at 13:30 | CommentPost a Comment

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