Bio:
Manuela Zammit is a contemporary art curator by profession with a special focus on text-based art and art that explores language. My research/making practice - textpresso - all started when I came across my first typewriter at a flea market in Holland and became fascinated with what can be done on these machines. Since 2019, and very much in the spirit of the concrete poetry movement from the 1960s, textpresso has been an ongoing playful experiment that uses words and linguistic elements to make visual arrangements and alternative poetry. Through the use of primarily analog tools, textpresso is a gently radical practice in that it advocates for a slow making process and the value of the handmade in a fast-paced and content-hungry digital age.

Rationale:
For this particular call, I got inspired by the plaque saying ' MODERN ART' situated just on top of the Mill's main entrance. My typewritten work is a visual arrangement of 9 rectangular blocks that when looked at up close, it turns out each one is made from the repetition of a letter that forms the phrase 'modern art'. I avoided the structure of a straight grid because I wanted the illustration to look like it's on the move and be more dynamic and playful, in such a way reflecting Gabriel Caruana's work. A defining trait of modern art is breaking the rules in order to create unexpected outcomes, which I also enjoy doing on my typewriter, a tool with many limitations that turn into possibilities when the rules of the device are pushed to their limit.

Follow Manuela's work on www.instagram.com/textpresso