Private Anthem

It plays hard to get, and then it plays on repeat.

Hard to get, first time round. A medley of contrasts nobody can wrap their head around. Then it steals up, a warm chill of something achingly familiar, something sunny and a little heartbreaky. So there is another go, and another, until it has nested somewhere behind the eyes and started playing itself. Then it starts scratching at the imagination and flipping up fresh ideas, and it wants humming everywhere.

Orange flower concrete thickens it. Vetiver and patchouli run dark and steady. Cinnamon warms it through the middle, neroli lifts the edge off. Violet keeps the melody cool and petitgrain keeps it green.

NOISE builds fragrances the way a record gets built. Sound comes first and everything follows from it: the three tiers on every product page are treble, mid and bass, and a play button sits beside every bottle. Sound shapes the world before anyone is born, and the familiar mixed with the unexpected goes straight past the intellect and into the deepest corners of the mind. Sound, sight and memory are the three powers the work draws on.

The work is made in France and handed to a rotating cast of noses that has included Bertrand Duchaufour, Mark Buxton and David Chieze. The subjects are ordinary on purpose: a rusty garden gate, an elevator ride, the gap left after a song ends. Each one is designed to make its own mark and not to be forgotten.