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Egon Schiele, Stylized Flowers in front of a Decorative Background, Still Life (1908).
You'd never pick up a bottle of Knize Ten by accident. For a long time, you couldn't even find it, it was so elusive. If you had chanced on it unawares, gathering dust in some dingy, small-town apothecary, you might have wrinkled your nose in disgust and moved on. If you were better versed in perfume history, you would approach reverently, eagerly perhaps, then warily, conscious that expressing dislike for Knize Ten would mark you as a hopeless troglodyte (such a snobby hobby), you settle for clinical and dispassionate objectivity. You see, Knize Ten is an unpleasant experience*.
Imagine watching a silent masterpiece, or maybe Fritz Lang's M, barely a sound film. The sound editing is choppy, the actors veer wildly from hammy to wooden, the premise is sensational, the visuals are saturated with the human grotesque, and the sophistication of the camerawork demands a subtle and patient audience. And yet, in spite of these imperfect modulations, M achieves a potency rarely seen. It is not quite originality. However, it is informed by an independence of artistic vision that has a very different tenor from the struggle-against-convention that underlies most contemporary art film. Nor is Knize Ten, in its own interpretation of Weimar decadence and of birch tar, an original, but it lacks the self-consciousness treatment that marks a modern niche perfume. Comparing Knize Ten to a contemporary leather would be akin to comparing M to The Silence of the Lambs. Vero Profumo Onda knows why it is different; it is legible to us because of that knowledge, because it plays against expectations already extant in its audience. Knize Ten cannot. The top notes feel harsh and synthetic, like a warm, flat bottle of Coco-Cola. Then it shifts into a crisp leather—never quite satisfying the urge towards tactile, buttery richness of a modern leather, such as Cuir Ottoman—against a backdrop of herbal bitters more frequently seen in a fougère. This places greater emphasis on the sylvan origins, rather than the animalic facets, of birch tar. For texture, the composition relies heavily on powdery, melancholic purple florals. In some ways, Knize Ten is no less an essay on violet and iris, yet it's not quite so obvious, not so mannered as Chanel's Cuir de Russie. Sometimes, context is everything when it comes to perfume. You would not approach Knize Ten unless context drove you to it. This is so far distant from Sephora's bestsellers you'd have to be looking for something different, but it is also not as affected, so deliberate about its own unusual status as a niche would be. Knize Ten belongs to 1924; it is not "ahead of its time". In the same way that patchouli became indelibly associated with the late 60s, this belongs to that grey-toned interwar era. It is strange and wonderful, as magnetic a presence as the great sadeyed repellent Peter Lorre, who played against Humphrey Bogart and Cary Grant and never diminished in their shadow.
OTHER REVIEWS
The Scented Salamander
The Scented Salamander (Part II)
Perfume Shrine
Sakecat
Yesterday's Perfume
Perfume-Smellin' Things
Now Smell This
Parfumïeren
The Non-Blonde
Aroma X
Galamb_Borong
Pere de Pierre (Mark)
Pere de Pierre (Dane)
Pere de Pierre (Thomas)
Basenotes
Makeupalley
* I personally like it. I don't mean to sound like this is a negative review. Except for Songes, none of my perfume reviews are negative. It's difficult to write on something so tenuous as scent unless you have good reasons.
Labels: egon schiele, iris, knize, leather, oriental, perfume notes, peter lorre, vincent roubert
4/17/2011 [0]
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