ABSTRACT
Whereas utopia is a visionary trope emblematic of idealism, however concrete, the avant-garde art manifesto is performative, challenging and an often outrageous expression of the principle of hope. It combines art and idealism, performance and statement, the rarefied and mundane, a mixture of reality and fiction. There is engagement with modernity and the promotion of creative producers as central to society, which is often part of a resistant aesthetic or broader revolutionary ideal. Recognition of this has concerned a struggle for autonomy in relation to the expression of sociopolitical values and determination of creative output, with an eye to injustice and other typically utopian concerns.
