MONTREAL.- The Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal is presenting Julian Rosefeldt: Manifesto. Through this expansive, thirteen-channel video installation, the German artist pays tribute to the eloquence and literary beauty of artist manifestos. Renowned Australian actress Cate Blanchett brought her exceptional talent to bear in this tour de force, which draws inspiration from architecture, film, performance art and the visual arts to present a modern take on and meaning to texts that shaped art history throughout the 20th century. According to John Zeppetelli, Director and Chief Curator at the MAC, this exhibition is “nothing less than a Manifesto of manifestos”.

Along with Françoise Sullivan and Scores, Julian Rosefeldt: Manifesto is part of the final series of exhibitions to be presented at the MAC before its transformation project begins in 2019. During the renovations, the MAC will remain active by moving in a smaller temporary space later in 2019, and by offering an artistic programming to the public.

A Manifesto of manifestos
Julian Rosefeldt delved into about 50 manifestos written by groups of artists, such as Futurists, Dadaists and Situationists, as well as the musings of artists, architects, dancers and filmmakers, including Kasimir Malevitch, Yvonne Rainer, André Breton, among others, to create this impressive work. As a prologue to the text montage unfurled through the following twelve collages, the first episode quotes the Communist Manifesto (1848), by Marx and Engels, which underscores the revolutionary origins of this literary form.

In this immersive work of art, the screens simultaneously loop their individual story, each lasting 10 minutes and 30 seconds and starring the highly versatile Cate Blanchett, who brilliantly takes on a wide variety of characters, including a schoolteacher, a homeless person and a stockbroker. Through Rosefeldt’s work, viewers also discover Berlin, the backdrop tying all these images together with its architectural points of interest and a patchwork of indoor settings, such as a laboratory, a bar and a classroom. In addition to the manifestos’ historical perspectives, Rosefeldt leverages various filming techniques and nods to cinematic classics, such as Michelangelo Antonioni’s La Notte and Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The relevance of these calls to action clearly shines through this work. Often penned by young men, these carefully considered and chosen words reveal both their boldness and vulnerability. The artist chose to have these words spoken by a woman who “conveys these declarations’ performative aspect and political value”, said Lesley Johnstone, Head of Exhibitions and Education and the MAC, and the exhibition’s curator.

Manifesto has been presented in over a dozen cities around the world; its presentation in Montreal will be its second in North America, after the Park Avenue Armory in New York.

Born in Munich in 1965, Julian Rosefeldt lives and works in Berlin. Internationally renowned for his visually opulent and meticulously choreographed moving-image artworks, mostly presented as complex multi-screen installations, Rosefeldt’s works are shown at museums and film festivals around the world. Recently, extensive solo shows were held at the Nikolaj Kunsthal, Copenhagen (2017) and HOW Art Museum, Shanghai (2017). His works are showcased in several collections, including the Burger Collection Hong Kong, and the collections of Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, Saatchi Gallery London, and the Museum of Modern Art New York. Julian Rosefeldt also teaches at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich (digital media, film and video).

This exhibition is curated by Lesley Johnstone, Head of Exhibitions and Education at the MAC.