This text has been published on two occasions: first in the catalogue, Exposición Ante América, which was for an exhibition held in 1992 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the discovery of the new continent, and in Revista Poliéster (no. 12, 1995). In both versions of the text, the Uruguayan art critic, graphic, and Conceptual artist, Luis Camnitzer (b. 1937, Germany), bases his analysis on the same work, in the second version, which is more radical, he comments on meeting Colombian artist Antonio Caro (b. 1950). Camnitzer goes so far as to consider Caro himself as one of his works of art; he deems the most important of his works is a series whose point of departure is the Firma de Manuel Quintín Lame. Caro, along with Cildo Meireles (b. 1948), Bernardo Salcedo (1939–2007), and Camnitzer himself, is a crucial Latin American Conceptual artist. All of these artists are concerned with having their ideological views come through in their work. In their art, they voice protest against inequality, governmental inefficiency in their countries, and the abuses of mostly North American imperialism. By considering Caro a visual guerrilla fighter and inviting Latin American artists to follow his example, Camnitzer considers Caro’s work, and the way it operates as an alternative to political protest, as one that does not embrace violence but instead exploits its own poetic potential to level open criticism in an indirect fashion. The work to which Camnitzer refers, Firma de Manuel Quintín Lame, was made using a number of different techniques: it was presented as an environment (1978), a silkscreen (1979), a mural (1980), and printed with annatto ink on paper at the aforementioned 1992 exhibition. Caro is one of the first Colombian Conceptual artists whose work makes wide use of advertising. His often roughly-made art is infused with humor and references to political, social, and historical issues that in some cases relate to debates on identity.
