Scent of Memory

You may think that, as a visual artist, my memories would arrive in colour.

A particular shade of blue.The exact grey of winter light or the golden glow just before sunset.

But no.

It is the smell that reaches me first, the strongest trigger in creating my memories.

The smell of dusty ground after rain transports me straight to our country house in the Czech Republic, where we spent all our weekends and holidays when I was young. The windows are open, and I lie in my room reading, waiting for the rain to stop.

The smell of new books always brings back a Christmas feel. I would receive lots of books each year, and the faint smell of fresh paper and ink feels inseparable from winter mornings, and the anticipation of stories not yet discovered.

The smell of pine forest takes me back to early morning mushroom expeditions with my grandfather. I would follow closely behind him, while he led me to the secret spots where he knew the mushrooms would be waiting. The scent of cool air and the damp moss made these mornings so adventurous.

Lavender is my mother — specifically her daily skin-care ritual. I remember watching her in the bathroom as she moved through the familiar steps, calm and unhurried, while I wondered what it would be like to be older and have a ritual of my own.

The smell of baby powder brings back the days when our boys were small enough to fit easily into my arms. I remember lifting them after their baths - warm and impossibly soft and cuddly. It was a time defined by the simple comfort of holding them.

And the smell of a fireplace instantly places me in my father’s studio in the forest — warmth, silence, and the serious business of making things without needing to explain why.

Curiously, none of these memories arrive visually.

Perhaps scent is simply the most direct of the senses. It arrives uncontrolled, then fades again.

I spend my days working with paints, brushes, pencils, and found objects, trying to capture feelings in visual form. Yet some of the deepest memories of my life appear to be stored somewhere in the air.

Inhale once, and the past returns.

Effortlessly. Unexpectedly. Completely.

Which makes me wonder if some memories are simply waiting in the air for us to notice them.

I wonder what you think.