manifestroom (2014) is a site-specific installation and participatory performance that functions as a conceptual “action headquarters” and serves as a meeting place for contemporary political needs. Set up as a space for interaction and political dialogue, manifestroom offers a variety of historic and foundational texts from radical artists and movements from around the globe — manifestos and speeches from the Black Panthers, Idle No More, the Quebecois Liberation Front, and feminist separatists like Valerie Solanas to name a few.

manifestroom is a home for daily interactions with radical texts including a series of performative readings and text activations I co-created with collaborating artist Lily Mengesha. As a public workspace for visitors to read and respond to the texts, manifestroom prompts audiences to consider the contemporary relevance of radical histories by spending time with the texts and by joining daily actions with Mengesha and I.

manifestroom is at once an archive and a place of creation. Performance artists and visitors alike contribute to creating a new, site-specific manifesto by typing thoughts and responses onto a ream of paper looped through several typewriters in the installation.

Alongside co-creator Lily Mengesha, I conceptualized manifestroom as a playful revival of the radical politics and thinking that brought our generation to its current moment—one both shaped by legacy and marked by political memory-loss.

Photos of manifestroom installation and performances at Leonard and Ellen Bina Gallery | Photos by Loan Kieu

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