Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology - uncopy

statements
cildo meireles
I remember that in 1968, 1969 and 1970 we knew we were beginning to touch on what was
interesting—we were no longer working with metaphors (representations) of situations; we
were working with the real situation itself. On the other hand, the kind of work that was being
done tended to volatilize, and that was another characteristic. It was work that, really, no longer
had that cult of the object, in isolation; things existed in terms of what they could spark off in
the body of society. It was exactly what one had in one’s head: working with the idea of the
public. At that time we were putting everything into our work, and it was being directed
towards a large, indefinite number of people: that thing that is called the public. Nowadays, in
fact, there is the danger of doing work knowing exactly who will be interested in it. The idea
of the public, which is a broad, generous notion, was replaced (through deformation) by the
idea of the consumer, which is the part of the public that has acquisitive power. Really, the
Inserçoes em circuitos ideológicos (Insertions into ideological circuits) arose out of the need to
create a system for the circulation and exchange of information that did not depend on any
kind of centralized control. A language. A system essentially opposed to that of press, radio
and television, typical examples of media that actually reach an enormous audience, but in
their circulation system there is always a certain control and a certain channelling of the inser-