Sissel Tolaas

Smell RE_searcher and artist.
Born in Norway based in Berlin, Germany.

Sissel Tolaas is an internationally recognized smell researcher and artist whose work has fundamentally reshaped the understanding of smell as a mode of knowledge, communication, and cultural memory. With an interdisciplinary academic background in organic chemistry, mathematics, linguistics, and art—studied across European institutions including Oxford—she has, since 1990, developed a rigorous, practice-based research trajectory dedicated to olfaction.

Her work integrates forensic chemistry, chemical communication, sensory ecology, linguistics, and visual art, establishing new frameworks for understanding smell as data, language, archive, and environmental indicator. In 2002, she founded the SMELL RE_searchLab Berlin, an independent laboratory collaborating globally with universities, art institutions, scientific institutions, and industry. The lab pioneers research into chemical communication, smell memory, environmental sensing, and molecular preservation.

Tolaas has received numerous international awards, including the CEW Award for Chemistry & Innovation (New York), the Rouse Foundation Award (Harvard GSD), the Ars Electronica Award (Linz), and multiple Synthetic Aesthetics distinctions (Stanford/Edinburgh). In 2010, she founded the Institute of Functional Smells & EI Smell Coding and launched the world’s first Smell Memory Kit.

Her work has been exhibited at leading institutions worldwide, including Museum of Modern Art, Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Serpentine Gallery, Hamburger Bahnhof, National Art Museum of China, and major biennales such as Venice Biennale, Kochi Biennale and Documenta 13.

She collaborates with institutions including Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, NASA, ESA, and industry partners such as Adidas & Balenciaga (Kering Group).
Her large-scale initiatives include the World Smell Archive Berlin Lab (20,000 molecules), 55 global City SmellScapes, and The Project Resurrecting The Sublime (with Ginkgo Bioworks and Harvard). Current research focuses on smell heritage preservation (Bahrain and Pompeii, UNESCO), climate and waterways in the Northern Hemisphere (2026-28), and setting up new smell research laboratories on: smell & emotional reaction & action, in among others Middleeast and South East Asia.