Číst akční umění. Texty vázající se k uměleckým akcím 60.–80. let 20. století v Československu

As a documentation material, the text is often overshadowed by photography – but unlike photography, it can mediate the processual character of performance art. In terms of form, it is possible to discern a typology of texts and assign each type to a particular literary genre. This paper is concerned with the description of an art event, which can be defined as the literary genre of “ekphrasis” (the discipline of art pieces description). Depending on the nature of the artwork, both ekphrasis and descriptions of art events are produced in between narration and description, as well as oscillate between interpretation and pure description. To illustrate this, several examples from the Czech scene of the 1960s to 1980s will be presented. Not only the content of the text but also its form determines our “reading” of the described artwork – in this case, the reception of art events of the last decades.