Testimony of Markéta Luskačová

Although the funerals of the victims of the Warsaw Pact armies' manoeuvres after the occupation of the country in August 1968 were tragic, soon, there were so many that the circles of the traumatised began to narrow to those immediately affected. In my search for the number of people who perished at that time, I experienced the shift that turns fates into statistics. Such loss of imaginability probably brings relief from the rush of unbearable reports. On the other hand, the hinted-at hardships may invite one to infer personal attitudes and actions... 

Although reflections on the decision of the twenty-year-old philosophy student Jan Palach (August 11, 1948 – January 19, 1969) to sacrifice his own life are inevitably guided by different perspectives than his own, their focal point remains a reverence for the ultimative rousing of fellow citizens from the sense of helplessness that prevailed at the time. After all, the Soviets considered the results of their explosive foreign policy at the end of the world war – and after – to be untouchable. They denied Czechoslovakia the right to self-determination for decades – because of the uranium deposits and the launching pad for strikes further west. 

With the book and exhibition Jan Palach 16-25 January 1969, organized to mark the fortieth anniversary of the martyrdom and the spectacular commemoration, photographer and curator Dana Kyndrová has made available the archival records of twenty-seven colleagues. Markéta Luskačová's testimony could not be omitted. Nevertheless, some of the images are being published by the Fotograf magazine for the first time; indeed, even the author's web profile does not cover the collection in its entirety.

The footage of the funeral procession for Jan Palach evokes memories of both the time of its creation and its outcome. Two decades after the self-sacrifice (far from being Palach's alone), has the desired transformation of the former existence into a new one not been fulfilled? In January 1989, it still seemed that the governing armed troops of the occupying power of the Soviets were holding their positions, but since the demonstrations of the so-called Palach Week, the puppet regime in Czechoslovakia was heading towards the inevitability of its collapse. Of course, the interplay of other influences was also evident... However, the symbolism that we take seriously makes us who we want to be.

Image captions

1–7 | Markéta Luskačová, from series ›Jan Palach’s Funeral 1969‹, 1969