RGBCMYKinetic | 2015



| video |


Five mirror-coated flat disks seem to float through space in unison. Three spot lights in the three primary colors, red, green and blue (RGB) project a circle of white light on the floor.

The discs reflect the light and cast colored shadows onto the floor. This set-up provides the basis for a poetic choreography and the immersive, spatial experience of colorful, synchronized lights and shadows moving in unison with the computative and weightless motion of the discs.

The colored ellipses on the ground are generated by reflecting and shadowing the spot lights. The mirror discs cast shadows behind them on the ground, and in these shadows the with light subtracts into cyan, magenta and yellow (CMY). In front, the discs reflect the RGB light as individual colors onto the ground. With this the three additive primary colors (RGB) and the three subtractive primary colors (CMY) are created out of the white light.

The kinetic choreography is complemented by a musical score that unfolds in dialogue with the discs’ movements. The three-part sound composition for RGB|CMY Kinetic was made by Icelandic musician, Ólafur Arnalds. The first part of the composition is based on the movements of the mirror discs: the varying heights of the discs in space modulate the five digital instruments. The following two sections of the composition interpret the computatively designed choreography more freely.

The installation RGB|CMY Kinetic was commissioned by Sónar and the Sorigué Foundation and premiered at SónarPLANTA Barcelona in 2015. Expanded by the dimension of black (the ‘K’ in CMYK stands for key=mask=black), RGB|CMYK Kinetic is a work produced for the opening exhibition at the Asian Art Center in Gwangju, South Korea.