The way I created my manifesto is largely based on the idea of creating the art that you yourself like to see. I referenced this article on 5 ways to write your own artistic manifesto for productive results to work on my own manifesto. My thought process is mostly about how I would go about making art and why do I make art. I emphasized on START creating art by starting because I find that the hardest part about making art for me is the start. Oftentimes, a blank canvas stresses me out. When I stare at a blank canvas for too long, my mind tends to blank out. At this point, I would feel like I am having a major mind block. However, once I start by rendering a random object say a line or a shape, my thought process will naturally kickstart. Therefore, I thought I include this as the start of my manifesto to encourage viewers who read my manifesto to not be intimidated by a blank canvas and just kickoff your thought process by creating anything! (mentioned in point 2 of my manifesto)

In addition, I find that creating art is an outlet for me to express my emotions. These emotions are not bind to just feelings like happy, sad or angry. They can be emotions such as the simple joy or satisfaction you get from tidying up your study table or deeper and more complexed emotions when you go through an impactful event. I want people to acknowledge their emotions no matter how trivial, I believe that this can spur many great ideas. I feel that it’s the easiest to gain inspirations from ourselves. We are the closest to ourselves, our own body belongs to us respectively. You do not have to travel to a specific place in order to find inspirations, find them from the one closest to you. It’s easier to express yourself when you acknowledge these feelings that you have and you find that you see yourself in your artwork. You will like to see the art you have created because you know that the artwork you have created are close to your heart. So start spending time with yourself, find your inner calling.

Of course, other than my own thoughts I also refer to the manifestos behind some great art movements in history. I can relate the most to the minimalism manifesto and the dada manifesto. I find that my manifesto is a combination of these two manifestos. For minimalism, the belief behind it is famously said by artist Frank Stella “What you see is what you see”. Minimalism upholds the idea that art should exist as art itself and not a representation of an object in the real world (for instance a landscape or a person). Viewers should just focus on the minimalist artwork as it is instead of associating it with something else in the real world. I relate to this belief and turned it into my own ideal whereby I mentioned that we should express our emotions. What we feel is what you feel and just express them while you create art.

Additionally, the dada manifesto is all about irrationality and it greatly challenges the meaning of art. Should art have a meaning? That is why I wrote in point 10 that we should all be misfits in the art world. Do not be afraid of judgement as I have come to learn that people judges anyway whether you invited the judgement or not so just create what you like and express yourself freely for your art exists because you do. Whatever that you have created allow people to question it, listen to their thoughts and acknowledge their emotions towards your art and gain further inspirations to create!