12 Facts About Luis Camnitzer

Luis Camnitzer was born on November 6,1937 and is a German-born Uruguayan artist, curator, art critic, and academic who was at the forefront of 1960s Conceptual Art.

Luis Camnitzer was born in Lubeck, Germany in 1937 and moved to Montevideo, Uruguay in 1939.

In 1957, Luis Camnitzer received a grant from the German government to study at Akademie der Bildenden Kunste Munchen At the Akademie, Luis Camnitzer was mentored by sculptor Heinrich Kirchner.

In 1960 Luis Camnitzer held his first solo exhibition at the Centro de Artes y Letras Montevideo and the following year began teaching at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes.

Luis Camnitzer subsequently moved from Montevideo to New York City in 1964.

Concurrent to his practice with the New York Graphic Workshop, Luis Camnitzer produced foundational works that explored the reflexive relationships between the viewer and artwork by means of language, such as This Is a Mirror, You Are a Written Sentence.

Also in this period, Luis Camnitzer produced a series of "object-boxes" in which ordinary items were placed inside wood-framed glass boxes with textually descriptive brass plaques.

Since the 1980s Luis Camnitzer has produced installations and site-specific works, such as A Museum is a School, in addition to his continuing practice in printmaking.

In 2024, Luis Camnitzer's work was included in Every Sound Is a Shape of Time, a collections-focused group exhibition at the Perez Art Museum Miami, Florida, curated by Franklin Sirmans.

Luiz Camnitzer work is placed next to Jennie C Jones, Alfredo Jaar, and Lawrence Weiner, among others.

Since the 1960s, Luis Camnitzer has focused on political subjects including identity, language, freedom, ethics, and historical tragedy.

Luis Camnitzer has written several books, including New Art of Cuba and Conceptualism in Latin American Art: Didactics of Liberation.