Pablo Suarez’s letter is defined as a work of art. It is, at the same time, a quit of his participation in the exhibition, which he handed out to the attending public at the Experiencias 1968 [The 1968 Visual Practices]. The author starts by recognizing the “moral impossibility” of continuing with his former art project, which he now feels quite unnecessary. His dilemma revolves around the question of whether it serves any purpose to do something inside the artistic institution, even something that would promote its destruction. Suárez concludes that any gesture, including the most radical or agitprop, within this milieu is destined to be neutralized and have no political influence because “art lost its danger.” He calls upon his generation to declare what it has to say on the streets. He maintains that the concoction of a new language by the emerging vanguard groups, far from being elitist codes, has generated “a weapon” that can be set in motion only “outside the showcase” of the museum. In the violence-inciting metaphors of the time, this “weapon” signifies an efficient political tool.

The Experiencias 1968, convened by the Instituto Torcuato Di Tella (ITDT)—which the English historian John King defined as the “epitome of experimentation and also of the tensions of the cultural development in Argentina during the end of the sixties”—constitute a key moment within the so-called Timetable for 1968. To wit: the radicalization of the Argentine artistic vanguard. That year, during this major annual event of vanguard art in Buenos Aires, several things are expressed. First, a limit is set on experimentation in the development of various trends. Second, the growing political radicalization of many of these artists is manifested by some of their artistic proposals, such as their intervention in the censorship. Third, the artistic vanguard loudly proclaims a split with the most important institution of the art circuit, which had formerly supported its activities: the ITDT.

Upon receiving the invitation, Pablo Suárez—one of the artists invited to participate—opted to carry out a happening in the area around the sponsoring institution. Initially, he had intended to set up an information booth and critique office regarding other art experiences, but instead he opted to install himself on a sidewalk adjacent to the Institute’s entrance and gave the public thousands of copies of a letter addressed to the director, Jorge Romero Brest, through which he announced he was quitting Experiencias. Suárez had 25,000 copies of the letter printed. Not only did he give them out at the entrance of the Institute during the course of the exhibition, he also used his contacts with the “canillitas” [newspaper sellers] guild, through which he included a copy of the letter in their newspapers and journals sold in the kiosks on Florida Street in Buenos Aires, where the ITDT was located.