Insertions Into Ideological Circuits: Coca-Cola Project
Newspapers, television, radio, and advertising—the official media—was controlled by a few Brazilians. Leftist publishers, directors, editors, filmmakers, writers, and artists were controlled by government censors. Freedom of expression was hard to come by. In 1970 Cildo Miereles found an alternative route to address the non-art public. First the artist rubber-stamped bank notes with politically charged opinions and sayings such as “Yankee Go Home.” He put the money back into circulation by paying his rent or buying groceries. Next he silk-screened similar messages on empty Coca-Cola bottles before returning them to the bottling plant for recirculation. The artist used vitreous white ink to match the Coke logo so that few noticed the altered bottle until they began to drink. These bottles and bank notes from Mierles’s Insertion into Ideological Circuits are coveted by present-day museums and collectors. They remain, however, artifacts, relics, or mementos from a political action, not intended as “works of art.”
|
|
