在这部存在与行动纪录片片中,电影制片人肯·麦克马伦和艺术家斯图尔特·布里斯利在《存在与行动》一书中合作探索了行为艺术的起源，并将其与现代主义联系起来，而是与英格兰和欧洲的古老民间仪式联系起来。这些仪式提供了一个演员和观众之间的分工尚未制度化的戏剧。它们证明了强大的行为传统，这些传统在从农业社会向工业社会的转型中幸存下来。表演艺术源于这些传统，但有意识地利用艺术家在社会中的疏离感和孤立感。这部电影中的艺术家之所以被选中，是因为他们的作品挑战了那些规范社会制度的人。演出的录音被广泛地操纵：画面变慢，支离破碎：细节被隔离，以构建事件的电影记忆。
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.
