​Manifesto-ish is the creation of four artists who shared space, time and ideas at the University of the Arts from 2008-2010. Though they each have interests and styles of their own, they found that they shared certain ideas about what art is, what it could do and how it could be done.



In a larger sense, Manifesto-ish is about sharing ideas, connecting with others and collaborating with artists and non-artists alike to create with and on the internet.



Manifesto-ish Founders:

Veronica Cianfrano​
Jessica Anne Clark​
Lauren McCarty​
Matt Zigler



The history of art is filled with ism’s. They succeed in creating a box and a boundary at the same time. They create a dualistic relationship of adversarial groups; Classicism/Romanticism, Modernism/Post-Modernism, Minimalism/Maximalism. The flawed belief is that the pendulum swings back and forth between one extreme and another. The system is more complicated than that. As Foucault’s pendulum swings, the earth rotates beneath and the drifting weight touches all points within a circle within a day. That is what an “ish” is; it may point in this direction now, but as the world turns beneath us we may touch directions as yet unknown.

We make work that is approachable. We make work that speaks in everyday language to everyday people and artists alike. We are artists that want to talk about real things with real people, from every walk of life. We can broaden our audience, broaden our ideas and broaden our impact if we don’t confine ourselves to the art jargon of our day.

​

We want work that is sincere. We recognize the art market, but we don’t concede our ideas to it. Our work is not calculated to succeed, so when it succeeds it will do so out of a sincere desire to pursue our interests in the best ways we know how; and if the market comes along with us it will do so on our terms. Instead, we want to be a part of an art community. We want to collaborate with like minded people to impact our communities in a positive way. If aspects of the market want to be a part of our community, they will be welcomed.