Rolling it Out, 2025
Manon
Written in response to MANIFESTO

Manifesto is an increasingly unpopular word for something which is in fact, very common - any declaration of ideas with a certain element of intention would qualify. Popular ones include the Declaration of Independence, the Communist Manifesto, and Mein Kampf - depending on how you feel about other people. Beyond this tricky triad there are scores of politicians, academics, scientists, artists, and communities, who took a look at the dominant thinking of their time and thought - here, have a slightly better idea. They then had the nous to write the policies of that better idea down. Having done that, people might read them and actually agree. The manifesto was a preeminent vehicle for change.

Not exclusive to politics; manifestos written for and against almost every relevant subject can be found - from feminism, to science-fiction, to impressionist painting. It is not all too surprising then that the manifesto has become somewhat taboo. People having ideas is scary to the steady guiding hand of power, and god-forbid you share those ideas. Worsening still, the term has been co-opted by some very unsavoury characters. It has fallen into those most seedy clutches, the hands of un-fuckable boys with AR-15s - they love to write manifestos. These sorties of very dull intent and even duller visions for the world are now most commonly found on the more backwater parts of the internet, often uploaded in advance of some violently familiar news coverage. Unsurprisingly, this has correlated in a decline among reputable authors flogging manifestos. The term has been quietly retired by people keen to skip the association with murderous losers, and in doing so we have begun to abandon a very good tool for discussing the new.

This brings us to DJCS, who is many things. He is a goth, a bogan, a friend, an excellent cook, a very talented curator of artworks and people, and most recently the author of his very own manifesto. It occurs to me now to ask if he owns a gun.

His writing in question: A Declaration for a New Art Movement: The COMMODE Method (2025), is also the second exhibition piece of DJCS’ thoughtful burgeoning artspace COMMODE. Yes, like the toilet. A vintage (assumedly well loved) commode resides in the gallery, the only place to sit if you really want to take your time and commune with the work. At first glance this is just schoolboy humour, seat of your brown-pants kind of stuff, but linger and you’ll notice the serious undertones of frailty and the loss of dignity. It is an object that reeks of humanity. This tongue-in-somewhere sense of tragicomedy continues to the walls where the manifesto itself is scrawled out onto a roll of (unused) toilet paper. Classic punk-rock, if a little pastiche, so it seems.

However, linger again and you will find a secret sentimentality here too. The valueless paper itself - what writing stock could touch you more intimately? Then there is the shaky chicken-scratch down the loo-roll. It’s laboured from as close a match as could be found to Iron Gall ink; a gentle nod to DJCS’ own Dutch ancestry, a place where Oak trees that produce this ink were sacred long before they were carved into crosses. In a heavier tilt of the head, it is the same ink that was used to scribe the stoically resistant He Whakaputanga and the swindlingly misleading Te Tiriti. So, it is political then, and along the same party lines as DJCS himself. Makes sense, as this manifesto like most, is something of a self-portrait. Change is still starting at home. Edging out this moment of introspection, the whole work is supported by two knackered old walking sticks. Relics recovered from the rest home that DJCS grew up in. Here the punk levity continues; crutches from the past - get it?

Then of course, the fine print. The eleven-point declaration is an expression of purpose, written with a faux-legalese pomp so as to remind you that the ass-wipe you’re looking at falls into a long and storied legacy of some very serious documents. It is a stencilling of reasons and shapes that DJCS sees his gallery taking over the next year; directions to where COMMODE fits into that ominous and mafia-like beast, The Art World, and how exactly to go about building a real community within it. It is in part a call-to-arms, a rallying cry against the terrible elitism, reductionism, flattening, mass-appeal, and institutionalisation of art. Highlighting in particular that accessibility in art does not equate to representation, and that appealing to allaudiences is very hard to do without accidentally calling them stupid.

This is deep stuff, and like anything serious in this glowing age of insincerity, it would prefer if you didn’t notice that. This manifesto is a very earnest statement on Art, class, access, and privilege - disguised cleverly as something disposable, worthless, personal.

Now I could tell you, in gross exacting detail, more about DJCS’ vision for the future; the written formulae of this semi-precious document - but I don’t want to. It’s not mine. This manifesto, as is the idea, speaks for itself. If you want to know it, debate it, defer to it, ignore it, be inspired by it - then you’re just going to have to read it. Describing would be transmuting, and I would no doubt lavish praise over the notions I agree with most, while deftly shoving the bits I might find more uncomfortable behind the sofa cushions.

Avoiding that - I’ll put it concisely; This is a work supported by the past, irreverent to the present. A shit-rag script that is not the key to the future of art, but is a toolset on how to see the future as DJCS imagines it. A good manifesto then, nobody needs to get shot. Part instruction, part reflection, an all-purpose invitation to his take on a new, real-life community.