Meta.Morf 2026: Future Manifestos
This is the age of AI.
It is time for new manifestos.
To set the course for future aesthetics.
Artificial Intelligence is sold to us as inevitable. Conflicts, politics, work, life, culture, and even the arts and thoughts are becoming promptable. As the AI prophecy unfolds, the world is increasingly steered by big tech and the few who own it. The pace quickens. Society lags behind.
Meta.Morf 2026: Future Manifestos restores the art of declaration as a necessary cultural force in the age of automated thinking. AI is here to stay. The question is not whether it will shape the future, but how—and who (or what) gets to determine its course.
The future ought to be declared with the force of Marinetti. More than a century has passed since his Futurist Manifesto. He would be ecstatic about the pace of technological innovation today, celebrating both the disruptions and the possibilities unleashed by AI.
Yet acceleration is not what we must fixate on. It is the trajectory—and who commands it.
Throughout history, the manifesto has been a powerful and unapologetic cultural and political tool, used by great thinkers to bend the future toward desired ends. Today, we need them more than ever.
Yesterday’s dream of open-source technologies has faded, replaced by corporate control. The global order is shifting. Democracy is drifting. The world is re-militarized. Whether hopeful or hopeless, the dominant narratives are not written by us.
We live in a moment that demands position-taking. Manifestos are needed, not as nostalgia, but as an antidote to algorithmically fixed futures. Whether AI-driven, radically human, hybrid, or cancelled before they begin, we must refuse to inherit prewritten paths towards tomorrow.
At Meta.Morf Biennale 2026, humans and AI stand together, reclaiming the manifesto as the weapon of choice to actively shape what comes next. Here and now, art is our testing ground for Future Manifestos in the age of AI.
Lead Curator and Artistic Director, Zane Cerpina
Director, Espen Gangvik
TEKS – Trondheim Electronic Arts Centre
