Columbia, meet your new Manifest Music and Arts Festival Creative Director: Frankie Buente! Frankie is a 21-year-old senior, originally from Lousiville, and this year they will be leading our Manifest to a victory lap of showcasing all of our hard work.
Buente is technically an interdisciplinary major here, studying both Production Design for Film and Television as well as Environmental Studies. However, they love how Columbia embraces students to break out of their mold and try different art styles. Buente uses music, painting, collaging, taking pictures, and so much more as an outlet for all of their creative ideas. Altogether, their projects always cohesively project the campy and crafty style that Frankie meticulously built as a brand.
Undisputably, this Manifest will stand out from other years with the help of Buente’s design. After considering applying for the past three years, Buente saddled down and created a completely unique portfolio to ensure this job. When Buente considered applying, they thought about their strengths versus their weakness and decided, "I wanted to show that I was capable of mixed media.” Buente conscientiously created their own “fake” theme when applying and utilized a literal “hands-on” technique by making their hands at the forefront of the design. Once the application impressed, Buente buckled down and created an entirely new concept based on this Manifest’s theme, which won them the prize of being selected as Creative Director.
Buente’s unique approach to this event involves using anything they can get their hands on! “I felt like this was a good year not to use AI, but to use things you could only make with your hands,” they said. As a way to go against art made pristinely by corporations, Buente tries to incorporate a fun and eclectic style that roots from collaging to showcase the perfect nature of being imperfect. Fun fact: Buente’s designs are made from real-world objects that they either found, crafted, or stitched together! “I started digging around my house … and I just started finding things,” they added. Buente took every measure possible from ripping up their own clothes to cutting down maps of Chicago for their hodgepodge theme to shine through. Most importantly, their art stems from a love of being able to source new ideas from old ideas, and they wanted to represent our Manifest in that manner. While digital art is beautiful and complex, this year’s designs will shine bright as a labor of love, crafts, and realness.
All in all, Buente hopes to foster a Manifest where people allow themselves to soak in the greatness they achieved this year. Our new fabulous patchwork theme truly embodies Columbia’s crazy intertwined network of brilliant artists and how they chose to express themselves. Buente dreamily asserts, “I want to encourage a Manifest where people are not limited by the discipline they are graduated with and to encourage people to re-use the stuff they made.” Your trusty Creative Director, Frankie Buente, will be spending the day cheering everyone else on, so we’ll see you and your art at this year’s Manifest Music and Arts Festival!