In 2011 the researcher May Puchet (b. 1964) conducted a series of interviews with individuals and groups. In those conversations she inquired about the origins and work routines of the members of the Octaedro, Los Otros, and Axioma groups, all of which were founded during the military dictatorship in Uruguay (1973– 85) and were known for their experimental approach and their preference for performance-conceptualist art. Fernando Álvarez Cozzi (b. 1953) tells Puchet that Octaedro was started in late 1978, and that, unlike him, the other members were graduates of the CEA (Centro de Expresión Artística) that was directed by Nelson Ramos (1932–2006). This group played an important role in the creation of the first installations produced in Uruguay, because the members believed that learning how to draw was an essential step toward the production of objects and their expression in space. Though Octaedro mainly focused on group productions, the members presented their own individual works at their first group exhibition [see in the ICAA digital archive “Octaedro. Expone Grupo Octaedro” (doc. no. 1260081)]. The group was consolidated later on, in 1980, at the exhibition they presented at the Alianza Cultural Uruguay–Estados Unidos [see “Octaedro expone” (doc. no. 1260107)] which included allusions to repression and political resistance. In his interview, Álvarez Cozzi describes the group’s collective and internal growth process, the difficulties they faced, and their various activities such as discussions, voting on proposals, and readings of works by a wide range of writers (such as Joaquín Torres García, Gregory Battock, Søren Kierkegård, Sol LeWitt, and Joseph Kosuth). This focus on learning and study reveals the group’s attempt to break down the barriers that kept them in cultural isolation, thus defying the hostile tone of the oppressive social and political environment in which they were confined. In response to questions about the conceptual nature of his works, Álvarez Cozzi explains that they went beyond the tautological orthodoxy of the artistic conceptualism in vogue at the time, for which “the work defines itself as a closed circle.” Instead, he claims, a work of art must be intrinsically polysemous, and therefore not be exhausted purely in terms of the artist’s essential priorities.