7.3 Institutionalization of performance art / performance collecting processes.6.2 Professionalization of performance art.5.3 Performance art from a political context.5.2 Critique and investigation of performance art.3.2 New York and avant-garde performance.The discipline is linked to happening, the Fluxus movement, body art and conceptual art. Some of the main exponents more recently are Tania Bruguera, Abel Azcona, Regina José Galindo, Tehching Hsieh, Marta Minujín and Petr Pavlensky. The main pioneers of performance art include Carolee Schneemann, Marina Abramović, Ana Mendieta, Chris Burden, Hermann Nitsch, Joseph Beuys, Nam June Paik, Yves Klein and Vito Acconci. The term 'performance art' and 'performance' became widely used in the 1970s, even though the history of performance in visual arts dates back to futurist productions and cabarets from the 1910s. The themes are commonly linked to life experiences of the artist themselves, or the need of denunciation or social criticism and with a spirit of transformation. Its goal is to generate a reaction, sometimes with the support of improvisation and a sense of aesthetics. The actions, generally developed in art galleries and museums, can take place in the street, any kind of setting or space and during any time period. It involves four basic elements: time, space, body, and presence of the artist, and the relation between the creator and the public. It had an important and fundamental role in 20th century avant-garde art. Also known as artistic action, it has been developed through the years as a genre of its own in which art is presented live.

It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a public in a fine art context in an interdisciplinary mode. Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. Le Saut dans le Vide ( Leap into the Void). Conceptual work by Yves Klein at Rue Gentil-Bernard, Fontenay-aux-Roses, October 1960.

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