The Smelling Committee

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The Smelling Committee is a collaborative project by Caitlin Berrigan, James Daher & Michael McBean.

OPENING SATURDAY MARCH 3, 6-8pm
Exhibition Features Artists Exploring Urban Life Through Sound, Sculpture, Installation, Performance, and New Media at Various Locations in New York City

STOREFRONT FOR ART AND ARCHITECTURE
Location: 97 Kenmare Street, New York City
Exhibition Hours: Tuesday through Saturday from 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

For further information about the exhibition, visit the website http://www.bard.edu/ccs/lostandfoundcity

Until March 24th, mark your olfactory findings in the neighborhood on a map from the gallery, hang it up and receive an official Smelling Committee badge!

Smelling Committee [Nolita]
Inspired by the olfactory bravado of the Brooklyn Smelling Committee of 1891, artists Caitlin Berrigan and Michael McBean invite reflection upon the ephemeral, odiferous fabric of urban neighborhoods. We use our eyes to navigate geographies, but it is our sense of smell that ties us most tautly to our emotional memories. Histories of New York are ripe with scents and stinks, some rousing citizen action just as the Smelling Committee of 1891 discovered oil refinery pollution along Newtown Creek. The Smelling Committee revival attempts to map a small portion of this heritage as a collective endeavor. Participants are invited to embark upon an audio-guided investigation of the aromatic territories of the Lower East Side, and to join the ranks of the Smelling Committee by returning a map of their discoveries for comparison and reflection. Perhaps patterns of culture, pollution, cuisine, disarray, weeds and refuse will emerge – developing a new natural history of the stench and fragrance of twenty-first century New York. Caitlin Berrigan and Michael McBean are interested in creating multi-sensorial objects, spaces and experiences inspired by instances of absurdity.

The Storefront show is composed of a number of newly commissioned and modified works that reactivate the space, including recorded olfactory tours of the urban environment created by Caitlin Berrigan and Michael McBean, designed for visitors to remap and renavigate Nolita and the Lower East Side; architectural/urban investigations and pedagogical projects of CUP (Center for Urban Pedagogy); Jonah Freeman’s imaginary megabuilding as city; a new outdoor urban projection/intervention by LURE (Aaron Igler plus collaborators); Mark Koven’s real-time, live-feed interactive/participatory work that explores history, geography, and the claim of territory; Mads Lynnerup’s performative-video infiltrations of other people’s navigations of the neighborhood’s streets; Jill Magid’s performance about her metaphorical seduction of a New York City police officer in the subterranean environs of the subway system; Costa Vece’s flags made of a bricolage of discarded clothing that contest national/local identities; and Stephen Vitiello’s sound installation that creates a provocative interpenetration of city and nature.