Rough Trade

In Rough Trade, various settings provide the backdrop for scenes that echo earlier films by Erik Schmidt. The story begins in his apartment, where he packs a bag with mementos, valuables, and bundles of cash. Dressed in a suit and coat, he makes a hurried departure. A theatrical fountain, a tennis court, an open-plan office, and his own apartment become the sites where the protagonist – the artist’s alter ego – meets other figures, themselves recalling earlier films. With them he plays, argues, communicates, and fights.

Reenacting familiar actions while pursuing new paths, the artist invites the audience to follow his attempt to liberate himself from his past through a tedious journey across Berlin. Rough Trade opens a new chapter in Schmidt's audio ­ visual work, abandoning linear narrative in favour of a sequence of scenes that unfold like a dreamscape of emotionally charged moments and intimate encounters. Here Schmidt explores themes of power, control, and the desire to escape a world seemly on the verge of collapse.

The film stages a poetic confrontation between personal and social tensions in a manner both intense and elusive, allowing viewers to perceive without fully grasping what is taking place. Shot on a phone camera, its restless dynamism recalls the logic of social media platforms, where visual information streams continuously, mirroring reality while generating a parallel visual world.

— Yara Sonseca Mas