An Exhibition Program by Barrio Pop Studio

Launched November 2, 2025

Scent Fair Austin is an annual exhibition and community gathering dedicated to exploring scent as a creative, cultural, and ecological practice. Curated by Carlos Moreno, the fair brings together artists, herbalists, filmmakers, craftspeople, and cultural workers whose practices engage smell as story, ritual, material, memory, and care.

Launched on November 2, 2025, the inaugural edition of Scent Fair Austin marked the beginning of a new curatorial initiative centering scent-based art, contemporary craft practices, plant knowledge, and community ritual. Hosted at Future Front House and supported in part by the City of Austin’s Nexus Award, the fair invited visitors into a sensorial environment shaped by Earth, Air, Fire, and Water—an immersive exploration of the elemental forces that guide creative and spiritual life.

OUR VISION

Why Scent? Why Now?

Scent is one of our oldest forms of storytelling. It carries memory across generations, marks rituals of care, and has the power to connect us to land, history, and each other. Scent Fair Austin expands the possibilities of olfactory art by bringing it into conversation with ecology, material craft, film, performance, and community participatory practices.

We see scent as:

• A cultural archive, carrying the histories and traditions of our ancestors

• A material practice, rooted in plant knowledge, ecology, and handmade processes

• A communal tool, capable of grounding spaces, holding memory, and creating connection

• A creative catalyst, inspiring artists to work across disciplines and senses

Each year, Scent Fair Austin invites the public into conversations that move between ritual, ecology, experimental artmaking, and collective imagination.

2025 EXHIBITION — Elemental

November 2, 2025 • Future Front House

The inaugural exhibition, Elemental, explored the forces of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water as mediums of ritual, memory, craft, and transformation. The exhibition featured:

• Olfactory installations

• Plant-based craft and botanical sculpture

• Incense activations and scent rituals

• Short film screenings commissioned by Barrio Pop Studio

• Community writing prompts + sensory stations

Featured artists included Nam Joti Kaur Khalsa, Paloma Mayorga, Jessie Rodriguez (WeSeeWaves), and collaborators whose work engages ancestral knowledge, ecological materials, and sensory storytelling.

Scent Fair Austin: Elemental offered visitors an intimate encounter with scent as both memory and material—inviting reflection on lineage, place, and the unseen worlds we carry with us.

Scent Fair Austin is an evolving commitment to collective creativity, environmental stewardship, and cultural storytelling.