NYC RGB

NYC RGB is part of a series of works in which Viktoria Schmid deals with historical color film processes. Using a special technique of color separation through RGB filters, the real temporal dimension can be concentrated on a cinematic triple exposure. The film strip was sent through the camera three times, exposing the material with a different color filter on each pass. First red, green, then blue. This method borrows from historical color film processes and corresponds to a separation of color by the photoreceptors in the eye. The temporally staggered recording of the color separations generates perceptual patterns in the condensation on a single film strip that go beyond a human experience of time and the perception of the human eye. What becomes visible in the color overlays, respectively in the repetitions and the resulting differences, celebrates the past moment in its uniqueness. Viktoria Schmid succeeds in demonstrating in the filmic reproduction that each moment has never been there before and will never return. With the triple exposure, real time is condensed and a new cinematic time level is generated.
The film was shot over a period of several months from the 20th floor of an atelier apartment in New York City, where the artist lived in 2020 during the initial phase of the pandemic, and finally again in 2022. Schmid's work explores everyday perceptions and how they can be sharpened through her art. Musician Liew Niyomkarn composed a sound design from field recordings made on site and synthesizer triads that are the acoustic counterpart to the RGB colors of the film.