Bio
Michael Manning (b. 1985, Corona del Mar, California) is an American artist whose paintings, videos, and web-based works explore how digital tools shape the marks people make and the images they share. His paintings borrow the sweeping gestures of abstract painting, with looping strokes, translucent washes, and sudden blocks of color. A gesture made with a finger on a touchscreen can become a printed image on canvas or a raised mark on linen. The movement between screen and surface is central to his work.
Manning received a BFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts in 2007. He began sharing work made on his phone through Phone Arts, an online platform for art made on mobile devices. In 2013, he began making his Microsoft Store Paintings on demonstration tablets in Microsoft retail stores, using the Fresh Paint app and emailing the finished images to himself. In his Wild Fusion series, he combined digital prints on canvas with acrylic paint. Other works use 3D printing to give simulated brushstrokes a physical relief. Across these projects, Manning treats the quirks and limits of software as part of the painting process.
That interest also informs his web project 100paintings.gallery, which recombines five layers of imagery each time a visitor refreshes the page. A related artist’s book, 100 Paintings, published by CURA. in 2016, brings together work made between 2010 and 2015 from four series, including Microsoft Store Paintings and Wild Fusion.
Manning’s solo exhibitions include Wild Fusion: Vol. IV – Technoeconomicology at Bill Brady Gallery in Kansas City (2014), And Alterations at Last Resort Gallery in Copenhagen (2015), I Hate Mondays at Mon Chéri in Brussels (2016), and Cheap Vacation at GAVLAK in Los Angeles (2017). In 2015, the New Museum and Rhizome included his work in Brushes, an online exhibition devoted to artists who publish digital paintings in series. His web-based work is also documented in Rhizome’s ArtBase.
