Luis Camnitzer

German-born, Uruguay and New York-based artist Luis Camnitzer (born 1937) confronts awkward social and political issues head-on, always inflecting his uneasy subject matter with a keen sense of humor and irony. Over the last 40 years, Camnitzer has developed an international reputation, not only as an artist, but also as a critic, educator and theorist. A leader in the realm of conceptual and political art in Uruguay, he works in a variety of media, including installation, printmaking, drawing and photography, to explore ... Read More

German-born, Uruguay and New York-based artist Luis Camnitzer (born 1937) confronts awkward social and political issues head-on, always inflecting his uneasy subject matter with a keen sense of humor and irony. Over the last 40 years, Camnitzer has developed an international reputation, not only as an artist, but also as a critic, educator and theorist. A leader in the realm of conceptual and political art in Uruguay, he works in a variety of media, including installation, printmaking, drawing and photography, to explore the former Uruguayan dictatorship, and more generally the violence that governments and systems of power inflict on individuals. In his chilling 2008 work "Last Words," Camnitzer collected the final statements of death row inmates in Texas, assembling a work that compels viewers towards the very brink of mortality. This publication surveys Camnitzer's influential body of work, from 1966 to the present. Read Less