The manifesto: what’s in it for us?

A core essay in the publication Manifesto Marathon. The third in the Serpentine Gallery’s acclaimed series of marathon events, took place in the closing weekend of the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2008, designed by Frank Gehry.

This publication showcases a new generation of artists alongside practitioners from the worlds of literature, design, science, philosophy, music and film who were returning to the historical notion of the manifesto.

The event drew on the Serpentine Gallery’s close proximity to Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park, which has been used as a platform by Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, George Orwell and William Morris, among other political and cultural icons. Featuring ‘manifestos’ by a diverse range of cultural figures and artists including: Marina Abramovic, Christian Boltanski, Brian Eno, Gilbert & George, Charles Jencks, Rem Koolhaas, Yoko Ono, Ai Weiwei, Mark Wallinger and Stephen Willats, among many others.

Biography

Melissa Gronlund is an editor of Afterall and a writer based in London. Focusing on artists' film and specifically on female filmmaking of the past 15 years, she teaches on the MRes: Moving Image course at Central Saint Martins and on artists' film at the Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art, University of Oxford, where she is a visiting lecturer. She is also interested in the overlap between text and image in contemporary art.

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