Boundary; a question without answers

synopsis

Hladík's simple action art events are constructed from deeper considerations, which were often based on conversations he had had with friends and artists who sought to deviate from the limited, thematic repertoire of a totalitarian society. The realisation of artistic action events was, to some extent, an empirical verification of these dialogues. The landscape and its unspectacular, personal interventions served as a suitable terrain for Hladík’s artistic experiments.

 

biography

Since 1981, Lumír Hladík has lived in Canada where he creates works on the border between conceptual art, action art, drawing, and video. However, the beginnings of his work date back to the 1970s when action art was created on the margins of the Czech art scene. Lumír Hladík was an active member in the body art circle alongside Petr Štembera, Jan Mlčoch and Karel Miler, but he bonded more with his friend Jiří Kovanda through the civility of his own action art. Hladík was among the few who actually documented his action art through film, with many of the events taking form as temporary interventions within the landscape. These recordings, which were originally shot on 8 mm colour film, were recently digitised in the National Film Archive and accompanied with the artist’s own explanations.

more about film

director:

Lumír Hladík