Scented Translations

The Artists

Jen Alexandra

Jen Alexandra’s practice combines sculpture, installation and performance to explore the artists role as querent, and the relationships between human and non-human. She proposes that art can connect with other realms of experience, interpret visions, or serve as a mode of knowledge itself. Objects, floating ontologically as artefacts and channels for intention, act as transitional objects between places. For Alexandra, folklore, nature-based worship and seasonal lore are ways to understand notions of spirit through studio-focused intuitive technologies approaching the unseen and spiritual as both a platform and tool for expanding understanding of creative practice and acts of devotion.

Jen lives in Ōtautahi Christchurch where she recently completed a doctorate in creative practice at the University of Canterbury Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha. Her work has been included in international and national exhibitions. Jen was the Olivia Spencer Bower Awardee for 2024.

Jo Burzynska

Dr Jo Burzynska is an award-winning Ōhinehou Lyttelton-based interdisciplinary artist, writer, and curator. Initially working in sound, her practice has become increasingly multisensory, with olfactory art now central to her practice. She has exhibited her work locally and internationally – from the Physics Room in Christchurch to MAXXI in Rome – and has been the recipient of multiple residencies, which include those of the Institute for Art and Olfaction in Los Angeles and Pollinaria in Abruzzo.

She is actively engaged in research into sensory interactions and their creative application, using a practice she calls crossmodal art. This research is informed by psychology, sensory science and anthropology, and was the focus of her doctoral research and recent book, The Sensory Terroir of Crossmodal Art (Routledge 2026). She is currently interested in exploring the different connections and understandings that can be made between people, culture, and place through a focus on embodied and nonvisual sensory knowledge.

In 2022 she established the Osmic Resonance Crossmodal Perfumery label, creating fine fragrance inspired by, or designed to interact with, sound. She also writes about her own research, and current crossmodal studies, in her Substack, Oenosthesia – Blending Wine and Sound.

Steven Junil Park

Steven Junil Park (he/they) is a Korean-born multi-disciplinary artist based in Ōtautahi. He is known for his work under the name 6×4 where he produces all manner of functional objects from recycled, repurposed, and vintage materials, focusing on the medium of clothing to address questions of identity and place. His practice is heavily process based, where materials come alive while being worked to create a language for communion with the intangible. He explores the potential for the hand-made to express and understand the human experience, viewing the tacit knowledge gained from craft practice as a way to understand what it means to be a person. He is a strong believer in the power of craft, where the transformation of materials from one state to another can double as a powerful way to transform the inner self. He sees collective arts practice as a framework for togetherness and connection in the cultural, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of the human experience.