Photo Essay

UNTRANSLATABLE

DYUTIMAN MUKHOPADHYAY PHOTOGRAPHY

‘There were a thousand smells in his clothes... The smell of sand, stone, moss… Even the smell of the sausage he'd eaten weeks ago. Only one smell was not there. His own. For the first time, Grenouille realised he had no smell. He realised that all his life, he had been a nobody to everyone. What he now felt was the fear of his own oblivion. It was as though he did not exist. 

He would teach the world not only that he existed—that he was someone. That he was exceptional. One final essence—a perfume of such subtle beauty and yet such power that for one single moment, every person on earth believed they were in paradise. 

What’s in there?

I am creating a perfume.' 

—from the film 'Perfume: The Story of a Murderer' (2006), Director: Tom Tykwer

A photomontage created from three (apparently unrelated) influences—

The first story:

Austrian academic painter Hans Makart's 'Death of Cleopatra' had a record sale at the Dorotheum auction of 19th-century paintings on April 16, 2013, for 757,300 Euros—a brilliantly rich painting. Following is the excerpt from the auction house Dorotheum in Vienna, one of the oldest and largest auction houses in the world:

'The painting . . . dates back to 1875, a period of great enthusiasm for all things Oriental. It depicts the dramatic moment immediately after the lethal bite of the serpent. The image derives its power from the contrast between the opulent splendour of the queen's garments and her delicate, opaque skin. "In this manner, the painter conveys an erotic-lascivious mood, further emphasised by the palpable vulnerability of the body. . .", writes Gerbert Frodl, former Director of the Belvedere.'

The second story:

A research blurb published on July 30, 2019, by the University of Hawaii followed by a The Times article stating that scientists have recreated Cleopatra’s 2,000-year-old perfume. A team of archaeologists and perfume experts have concocted a scent that they say was the Chanel No. 5  'of the day’, and which may have been used by the last queen of ancient Egypt.

The third story:

The character of fictitious French perfumer Jean-Baptiste Grenouille from the 2006 film directed by Tom Tykwer—'Perfume: The Story of a Murderer'.

photo essay: untranslatable

—'Untranslatable/Composition with a bottle of Chanel No. 5, chains, my nose, and the snake from Hans Makart’s Death of Cleopatra (commons.wikimedia.org)’. Artistic rendering in Adobe Photoshop v. 26.4.1; Bangalore, India; March 2025.

References:

Dorotheum, World record sale for Hans Makart at Dorotheum (2013). Available at: https://www.dorotheum.com/en/p/world-record-sale-for-hans-makart-at-dorotheum/ (Accessed: 11 March 2025).

The University of Hawaii News (UH Home), Cleopatra’s ancient perfume recreated (2019). Available at: https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2019/07/30/cleopatras-perfume-recreated/ (Accessed: 11 March 2025).

IMDb, Perfume: The story of a murderer (2007). Available at: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0396171/ (Accessed: 11 March 2025).