Collective Actions: Audience Recollections From the First Five Years, 1976–1981

Active in Moscow since 1976, the Collective Actions group played a key role in the development of performance art in the Soviet Union. Inspired by the work of John Cage, the organizers invited audiences to take part in minimal, outdoor actions in fields and forests on the edges of the city. These spatio-temporal events directed viewers' attention to the pure contemplation of their own perceptions, and over time, the actions produced a great variety of documentary material. Collective Actions: Audience Recollections From the First Five Years, 1976–1981 concentrates on the early period of field actions when the problems of documentation — how to capture and convey ephemeral action to non-participants — were just beginning to be considered.