COURAGE

Свързване на колекции

Mojmír Vaněk organized a symposium on the topic "Culture and Freedom" on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia and on behalf of the Society for Science and the Art (SVU) on 28 October 1978. The so-called table ronde was held in French and was attended by six prominent people from Swiss and French cultural life: President Pro Helvetia, R. Ruffieux (Lausanne and Friborg), B. Dorival (Paris-Sorbonne), Jeanne Hersch (Geneva), G. Gottier (Geneva) and literary critic Francois Bondy (Zurich). This event was exceptionally well received in the Swiss press as well as in Czechoslovakia. Mojmír Vaněk presided over this symposium.

The event started by dr. Mojmír Vaněk as chairman of the SWU Swiss Group, where he outlined the main features of the genesis of the Czechoslovak state, which is closely linked to Switzerland. He talked extensively about Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk's liberation work and stressed Masaryk's morality, which he felt was a model at a time when the freedom of the nation and its education were once again profoundly threatened, and when true culture must be based on morality. The audience of this symposium filled one of the biggest lecturers of the new university building in Geneva.

Likely in connection with this event, in November of that year, the Ministry of Interior of the Czechoslovak Republic had revoked Vaněk’s citizenship. His wife, Olga Vaňková, who was also a member of the Society for Science and the Arts, had her citizenship revoked as well.

The BOOM festival in Novi Sad was held in November 1978. Performances were held by the new wave bands Paraf, Prljavo kazalište, Pekinška patka, Zvuk ulice (the forerunner of Idoli) and Aerodrom. Prljavo kazalište was then considered to be the group that had the greatest potential to break to the top of the music scene, which was confirmed by the release of their first album in 1979, Prljavo kazalište. It was this album that marked the beginning of the new wave. Their first studio album, due to its punk style and heavily social themes, led to a boycott by state media in the socialist society of the time.

Artpool organized several shows presenting visual poetic tendencies in other venues and in its own exhibition space (Artpool P60): Pacco dall’Italia (1979 APS no.2, PACCO dall'ITALIA (Italian Package) PIK Galéria, Csepel, Budapest): the exhibition material would have been made up of the visual and sound poetry works collected during the Italian Art Tour (of the previous year), combined with mail art works. The show was banned by the state cultural authorities.

As Artpool did not have a permanent art space during the years when it was functioning illegally, most of the events which were organized at the time were held at different locations, such as clubs and small galleries. These sites were referred to as the Artpool Periodical Spaces (APS). These exhibition events were always accompanied by documentation materials of some kind, including posters, artists’ books and publications, and catalogues in which theoretical texts and translations on correspondence art, mail art, and artists’ stamps were first available in Hungary. Along with György Galántai’s own network art, these publications formed the essential exchange material when it came to the expansion of the archive.

In 1979 the Museum of Czech Literature bought first part of the Dominik Tatarka collection. These materials included his correspondence (22 letters), and manuscripts of his works (more than 1000 pages). This acquisition was mediated by Slovak historian and dissident Ján Mlynárik in cooperation with the employee of the acquisition department of the Literary Archive of the Museum of Czech Literature Marie Krulichová. However, direct purchase from Dominik Tatarka was not possible. That is why the Museum of Czech Literature officially purchased materials from the antiquarian bookshop in Karlova street in Prague that had previously bought them from Tatarka. The Slovak writer then obtained from the bookshop two thirds of the price paid by the Museum of Czech Literature and it was a significant sum. Thus, the willingness and courage of the employees of the Museum of Czech Literature and the above-mentioned antiquarian bookshop significantly helped to improve living conditions of Dominik Tatarka, who was at that time oppressed by the Czechoslovak communist regime.