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Milan Knížák is a Czech artist, musician and performer. His works cover a broad range of activities – art, architecture, fashion, design, music, poetry, photography or action art. His first exhibition took place in 1958 in Mariánské Lázně. Since the beginning of the 1960s, he started with performance art – happenings – and realised several installations in Prague. Knížák and his friends founded a group called “Aktuální umění” (Actual Art), later known as “Aktual”, in 1963. It was a group of young artists focusing on new forms and action art, and one of its goals was to connect art and common life. The group published samizdat magazine of the same name, in addition to newspapers and flyers and as well as organising street events, exhibitions and happenings. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts (AVU) between 1963 and 1964, though did not finished his studies. He then became a member of the Union of Visual Artists in 1965. He was registered as an “unwanted” person by the State Security a year later. In 1967, he founded a music group also called “Aktual” in Mariánské Lázně. Jindřich Chalupecký, an art and literary critic, mediated contact between Knížák and the movement Fluxus; this lead to Georg Macinaus inviting Knížák to travel to the United States, where he attended events organised by the movement in 1968. In 1970, Knížák returned to Czechoslovakia and renewed the music group Aktual, which significantly influenced the Czechoslovak underground and music groups such as The Plastic People of the Universe, DG 307 and Umělá hmota.

During the 1970s, he was followed by the State Security and arrested several times. By the end of the 1970s, he was allowed to travel to Western Germany and Austria, where he gave lectures and created art. He became the rector of the Academy of Fine Arts (AVU) after 1989 and director of the National Gallery in Prague between 1999 and 2011. He gives lectures at both Czech and foreign universities, has organised dozens of group and individual exhibitions in the Czech Republic and abroad and has written several books. Knížák’s opinions, his activities as the director of the National Gallery and some of his contemporary works have also caused controversies, some of which have led to lawsuits.

Pavel Kocman was born on October 25^th, 1968 in Hustopeče. He spent his childhood in southern Moravia in Valtice and Břeclav, where he attended grammar school. In 1987 he was accepted to study of history and archival studies at the Faculty of Arts at UJEP in Brno. At the time of the outbreak of the strike in November 1989, he joined the Strike Committee at the Faculty of Arts, UJEP. Initially, he put posters on the walls, but soon prof. Zdeněka Rusínová contacted him. She knew he was studying archival studies, and suggested that he start organising the documents, posters and all of the other artefacts that were on a pile in the Strike Committee.  Doing that he set the foundations for the current collection. This collection he later arranged with other students: Darja Golková (later married Kocábová), Renáta Brožová (later married Růžičková) and Ivo Durec. After completing his studies in 1993, he was employed as an archivist in the district archive, worked at the Czech Television and at the Jewish Museum. The history of the Jews in Moravia eventually became his main theme of interest, which he has dedicated himself to since. He also teaches this subject at the Faculty of Arts of Masaryk University, and the Faculty of Arts at Charles University in Prague.

Darja Golková was born on 8^th November 1967 in Ostrava. From early childhood she lived in Brno, where she attended elementary school and grammar school. After graduation she was accepted to study history and archival studies at the Faculty of Arts, UJEP, Brno in 1986. She was one of the students at the Faculty who joined the FF UJEP Strike Committee during the November 1989 Revolution. Together with Renata Brozova, they joined Pavel Kocman and Ivo Durec and helped them to organise documents and create a set - today's FF UJEP Strike Committee materials. In 1990, together with Renáta Brožová, she was the author of the final version and the organisation of the entire collection, which she handed over to the Archive of Masaryk University in the following year. After graduation, she became an archivist at the Břeclav State Archives, based in Mikulov, where she has worked since.