KASSEL, 5 July – Trilby Minotaur has taken us up in some of dOCUMENTA (13)’s helicpoters and Milena Berman has taken us stomping through its muddy fields. Today perfumista Katherine Chan gives us the smell of dOCUMENTA (13) in her essay on perfume.

 
In 1945 fashion and war photographer Lee Miller had the opportunity to visit Hitler’s Berlin apartment where she famously took a bath in his tub. While there Miller also stole a bottle of perfume from the late Eva Braun. At dOCUMENTA (13) an exhibit shows Miller’s photographs, the perfume bottle, and Braun’s powder compact that Miller also took. In Byzantine artworld fashion, 2012 museum security guards would not allow Chan to take a photograph of the perfume bottle that Miller stole from Braun in 1945. Perhaps it’s for the best as it gives Chan the opportunity to let her mind roam across ideas of perfume and war and bring us to New York artist Lisa Kirk’s 2009 perfume project “Revolution.”

documenta 13, Katherine Chan, Lee Miller, Lisa Kirk, Perfume, Perfumista