Movement for the Liberation of the Coca Plant

07
Jan

Photo by Mariana Reyes

Photo by Mariana Reyes

Photo by Mariana Reyes

Photo by Mariana Reyes

Photo by Mariana Reyes

Movement for the Liberation of the Coca Plant

Wilson Díaz Polanco

Artist’s country of origen: Colombia
Materials: Neón
Medium: Sculpture, Installation, Digital Art / New Media
Size: 140 × 114 × 5.5 cm
Year: 2012 – 2014

Line of Inquiry:

Coca-Politics

In this neon installation, Wilson Díaz transforms a simple phrase, “Movimiento de liberación de la planta de coca”, into a luminous declaration. The work reclaims the coca plant from decades of stigma tied to drug policy and the armed conflict in Colombia. By inscribing this call to liberation in glowing light, Díaz invites viewers to reflect on how language, power, and perception shape the fate of both plants and people.

The piece challenges official narratives of eradication and control, proposing instead a symbolic and literal “liberation” of the coca leaf. Díaz advocates for recognizing the plant’s ancestral, medicinal, and cultural dimensions, which have been overshadowed by its association with narcotrafficking. Through its simplicity and clarity, the neon text becomes both artwork and manifesto, a call to restore the coca plant’s dignity and to envision new, decolonial relationships between nature, politics, and society.

The Artist

Wilson Díaz Polanco

Wilson Díaz Polanco is a Colombian visual artist exploring the sociopolitical landscape of Colombia through popular culture, armed conflict, and media representation.

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More From This Artist

Flaky Landscapes – Work with the nails

06
Jan

Flaky Landscapes – Work with the nails

Edinson Quiñones

Artist’s country of origen: Colombia
Materials: Digital Print
Size: 15 x 25 cm
Year: 2012 – 2019

Line of Inquiry:

Coca-Politics

The series Flaky Landscapes – Work with the nails presents miniature scenarios integrating model figures, bills, coca leaves, and cocaine crystals representing everyday situations where European and American characters immerse themselves in the “Colombian snow”.

The Artist

Edinson Quiñones

Edinson Javier Quiñones Falla Campo Zemanate is an artist of Nasa descent, born in La Plata, Huila (Colombia) in 1982. He holds a BFA in Visual Arts and a Master’s degree in Arts Integrated with the Environment from the University of Cauca.

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If it’s Bayer, it’s good

06
Jan

If it’s Bayer, it’s good

Edinson Quiñones

Artist’s country of origen: Colombia
Materials: Digital Print
Size: 100 x 80 cm
Year: 2017

Line of Inquiry:

Coca-Politics

In the work If it’s Bayer, it’s good, Quiñones appropriates the symbol of the German company to point to the role of the European and North American pharmaceutical industry in stripping the sacred coca leaf of its ancestral meaning. Since the extraction of the psychoactive alkaloid cocaine by european scientist, the plant became of popular use for scientific purposes, as anaesthesia in dental surgeries (although later replaced with less risky substances).

Following the mid-19th-century extraction of cocaine from the coca leaf by German chemists Gaedcke and Niemann in around 1860s, the plant entered European scientific and medical pharmaceutical industry. This chemical research enabled companies such as Merck and Bayer to commercialize isolated plant compounds, transforming coca from a sacred Andean plant into an industrial medical substance.

The Artist

Edinson Quiñones

Edinson Javier Quiñones Falla Campo Zemanate is an artist of Nasa descent, born in La Plata, Huila (Colombia) in 1982. He holds a BFA in Visual Arts and a Master’s degree in Arts Integrated with the Environment from the University of Cauca.

Read more