THE NEW COLOR

Initiated in 2011, ongoing;
5-channel video installation; HD film; website: thenewcolor.net; book, edition of 50

Film Credits
Directed, Edited, Scripted, Produced: Ègor Kraft
Camera: Niko Tsarev; Web: Andrey Starkov
Voice: Sara Woodgate, Cory Levinson;
Acting: Stephen Thompson, Clive Spalding, Julien Saumande, Katya Anokhina;

An online intervention and mystification of a scientific breakthrough-discovery of previously 'non-existent' color. Presented in a form of a website of fictitious American company, video ads and mocumentary interviews became a viral sensation attracting mass online attention. The website is presentation of non-facts as news explores the intrinsic power of the media to transform public perception and stand in for new forms of knowledge production. It explores manipulative means of media, its capacities for disinformation and legitimisation of constructed fictions.

'The New Color' is an online intervention initiated as a website (thenewcolor.net) for a non-existent US-based company. ACI Inc. supposedly specializes in the field of applied chemistry. The fictitious company announces a fictitious breakthrough – a previously ‘undiscovered’ colour. The webpage describes that no screens are currently capable of displaying the colour due to the RGB (red, green, and blue) additive colour model used across digital display screens. Red, green and blue can be combined in various proportions to obtain any colour of the visible spectrum, except the new discovery – Neochrome. According to the announcement, the new colour has nothing in common with any of its primary siblings. The website is the presentation of non-facts as news — including advertorials and video interviews — which together misuse the intrinsic power of the media to transform public perception and exploit various forms of knowledge production. The significant part of the project is its broad social impact. The 'The New Color' became a viral sensation by attracting significant online attention. Hundreds of thousands of visitors visited the website since its launch, having discovered it via search engines, social media posts, Reddit threads, and even YouTube videos about it.

The most intrigued and deluded by the so-called discovery emailed the fictitious company. These emails included requests to view the colour, numerous testimonials, requests to order a sample, intentions to visit the laboratory in Ashland, PA, business proposals, expressions of interest in investment, press enquiries, random rumours and other reactions to the mysterious Neochrome. In 2017, the project was followed with a reportedly ‘leaked video’ where a lab visitor's attempt to capture the colour on a smartphone camera failed due to inability to register a hue beyond a blend of red, green, and blue. A book, featuring a few hundreds of selected emails received at fictional companies' email box, was published to document public reaction.
To this date, in most cases, Googling ‘New Color’ delivers the digital myth's website on top of the search result list. Thus, continuing to explore the extent to which the absurd narrative, emerging long before the popularisation of the term fake news, can reach in the era of misinformation epidemic. As well as our digitally stimulated curiosity and imagination when the virtual saturates the real ever more.

New Color Film Trailer. 2017, Duration 04'47"

Neochrome, The New Color film stills

The New Color exhibition view at Akkta, a solo show in Anna Nova Gallery, St. Petersburg, 2018

'New Color' Book

A published book of selected emails sent to the fictitious company, including requests to view the colour, numerous testimonials, requests to order a sample, intentions to visit the laboratory in Ashland, PA, business proposals, expressions of interest in investment, press enquiries, random rumours and other reactions to the mysterious Neochrome.