Black Dahlia Noir Perfume-“A Femme Fatale and Fatal Flower” and the Scent of Death?
July 28, 2020
Los Angeles, California
“The formless fastidiousness of perfumes in a seventeenth-century boudoir is comparable to my mind in the presence of twilight.”
George Hodel
The Clouded Past of a Poet
December 9, 1925
Los Angeles Evening Herald
Fetish (noun)
a form of sexual desire in which gratification is linked to an abnormal degree to a particular object, item of clothing, part of the body, etc.”Victorian men developed fetishes focusing on feet, shoes, and boots”
I initially commented on the Givenchy perfume “Black Dahlia” back in 2011 when it was first introduced and promoted. I found the product to be opportunistic and in bad taste in the extreme.
Memorializing Murder? Marketing the scent of Death? A perfume, inspired by one of the world’s most infamous sex crimes that involved the kidnapping of a young woman who was taken to a private residence and bound hand and foot and sadistically tortured with cigarette burns to her back and knife wounds to her body. Then the coup de grace, blunt for trauma to her head, and the excising of her right breast? This followed by a surgical bisection and the posing of her body as a surreal artwork on a public vacant lot.
This is Givenchy’s inspiration for women to wear to attract and allure?
I am updating my original blog posts to include what I believe was “the marketing teams” possible source (consciously or not?) for their photo and video promotions.
I believe that the source may well have come from surrealist photographer Man Ray’s early photographs involving his own personal fetishes with bound nudes.
In addition, consider the photographs he took for his friend, William Seabrook, which clearly demonstrate Sado/Masochistic scenes and the wearing of a collar similar to the one worn in the Givenchy advertisement.
I also cannot help but notice the similar “costume” worn by the Givenchy model with the black strap at the waist which we know that Man Ray used in his early photographs to suggest bisection of the upper and lower torso, arms and legs as seen below in his 1930 photograph “White and Black”.
2011 Givenchy introduces new perfume Dahlia Noir
Promoted as a “Femme Fatale and Fatal Flower”
Dahlia Noir launches on August 22, 2011, in France. A 50 ml bottle of the Eau de Parfum is priced at 82€. ($96.00 US)
See short ad promo at below link:
2011 Givenchy Video promo ad for Black Dahlia perfume
Photo clips and stills from Givenchy promo 2011
Six-Surrealist Man Ray photographs from (Paris, France)
Juliet Man Ray William Seabrook Lee Miller Unk Man Ray Nude
Photos by Man Ray 2 Fetish scenes for Anthropologist William Seabrook 1930
August 1, 2012, an excellent related article by Susan Amper.
Click on the link below for the full article.
Death of a Dream: The Black Dahlia
Wow, sick in the extreme. I am guessing that a lot of customers would not make the connection. I sure did.
Steve, The perfume, like so many people (male & female) we meet throughout life, epitomizes the song “Smiling Faces” sung by “The Undisputed Truth”! Behind the beguiling smile, the admiring eye, the hand rub on the back, lies the sledgehammer of abuse …..and unfortunately sometimes death. When you sniff it, follow your gut & run like hell!!
Very sick, and very reminiscent of a fad in art and advertising in the late 70s termed “terrorism chic”, that promoted clothing and cosmetics with creepily evocative scenes of car wrecks, or women who’d clearly been battered.
I like Patricia O’Neill’s comment- she captures the essence of it with precision.