About this artwork
Cildo Meireles’s ongoing Coca-Cola Project, an extension of his Insertions into Ideological Circuits project, interrogates how power—socioeconomic and political—is distributed through networks of commodity and information exchange. Since 1970 Meireles has removed Coca-Cola bottles from circulation and inscribed statements, questions, and instructions in white text on the glass in the style of the brand’s label.
Noted on each bottle is Meireles’s intention: “To register in- formations and critical opinions on bottles and return them to circulation.” Each bottle also carries a distinct political provocation. These three read, “Yankees go home!”; “Jesse Helms No!”; and “Which is the place of a work of art?” With this project, Meireles—and his growing number of unknown collaborators—emphasizes the global reach of American consumer culture by subverting one if its most popular emblems.
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Status
- Currently Off View
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Department
- Contemporary Art
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Artist
- Cildo Meireles
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Title
- Insertions into Ideological Circuits: Coca-Cola Project
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Date
- 1970
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Medium
- Three glass bottles, three metal caps, and vinyl-tranfer text
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Dimensions
- 25 × 6 × 6 cm (10 × 2 × 2 in.), each bottle
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Credit Line
- Gift of Mel Bochner and Lizbeth Marano
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Reference Number
- 2014.1201
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.
