Manifesto

For 'Manifesto', German artist Julian Rosefeldt worked with Australian actress Cate Blanchett to give new life to some of the most famous and provocative writings by artists of the modern era.

Rosefeldt edited and reassembled a collage of artists’ manifestos to create a series of striking monologues that draw on a range of sources, from declarations penned by the Futurists and Situationists, to the musings of individual artists, architects, dancers and filmmakers such as Yvonne Rainer and Jim Jarmusch.

Blanchett performs these ‘new manifestos’ while inhabiting thirteen different personas – among them a school teacher, a newsreader, a factory worker and a homeless man – to explore the power and urgency of these historical words in today’s world.

Rosefeldt, who is based in Berlin, came to prominence on the cusp of the twenty-first century and is internationally renowned for his visually opulent and meticulously choreographed moving image artworks. Inspired equally by art, film, architecture and the history of popular culture, he creates complex multi-screen installations that carry viewers into surreal, theatrical realms.

'Manifesto' has been proudly commissioned by the Art Gallery of NSW and ACMI, Melbourne with Hamburger Bahnhof – Museum für Gegenwart, Berlin and Sprengel Museum, Hannover, and Ruhrtriennale – Festival of the Arts.