Manifesta
Manifesta, the roving European Biennial of Contemporary Art, is a European pan-regional contemporary cultural biennale.History
The Manifesta Biennial Festival was created in 1994, and the first edition took place in Rotterdam. One of the coordinators in Rotterdam was Thomas Meyer zu Schlochtern of the Rotterdamse Kunststichting. Among the local artists brought into the international scene, were Jeanne van Heeswijk, Bik Van Der Pol and Joep van Lieshout.
The 2006 edition of Manifesta was set to happen in Nicosia, Cyprus under the direction of Florian Waldvogel, Mai Abu ElDahab, and Anton Vidokle. In June 2006, Nicosia for Art, the city-run nonprofit organization sponsoring the exhibition, cancelled the event due to political turmoil around the green line of Nicosia.
The 10th edition of Manifesta in Saint Petersburg in Russia created tensions as the government had just prohibited "gay propaganda".
The 12th edition of Manifesta was held in Palermo, Italy around the theme "The Planetary Garden. Cultivating Coexistence". The exhibition put forward an interpretation of the city's history as the expression of a syncretism of cultures across the Mediterranean. The curators used the idea of the garden as a metaphor on how it might be possible to aggregate differences and to compose life out of movement and migration.Editions
Ownership
The Manifesta Biennial is owned and organized by Amsterdam-based International Foundation Manifesta.
