Dragoljub 'Raša' Todosijević

Druga linija aka The Other Line is a product of many years of research of neo-avant-garde cultural and art scene in Novi Sad, Serbia (late 60s and 70s), which has been marginalized until today. This artistic movement was directly connected not only with important art centers of the former Yugoslavia, but also with existing flows of world art during its brief and productive activities (7e Biennale de Paris, 19th Berlinale). The cultural and artistic emancipation of that time had implied individual freedom of expression and strong reaction to established boundaries. This avant-garde movement had become threat to communist establishment, the authors' work were sabotaged, the films were sealed off, five artists were taken to trial, two were sent in prison. How is it that the retrograde mechanism of shutting down and removing the most creative and representative progressive impulses of our surrounding is still so current to this day?

About Performance Art and its historical origins including its links with folk customs. The film includes extracts from the work of many different performance artists from England and abroad collected from 1979 to 1983, amongst them: Tibor Hajas (Hungary), Rasa Todosijevic (Yugoslavia), Iain Robertson (Scotland), Zbigniew Warpechowski (Poland), Milan Knizak (Czechoslovakia), Natalia LL (Poland), Ewa Partum (Poland), Jan Mlcoch (Czechoslovakia), Sonia Knox (Northern Ireland), Jerzy Beres (Poland) and Stuart Brisley (England). The film also records the Haxey Hood and Padstow Hobbyhorse folk dances from Lincolnshire and Cornwall respectively.

The film is a tribute to the alternative art scene that ‘internationalized’ the Yugoslav cultural landscape over 30 turbulent years of social changes.