Czechpoint: The International Exhibition and Festival of Political Art, curated by Tamara Moyzes and Zuzana Štefková, is an exhibit in two parts that includes paintings, photographs, video and installations by more than 60 artists from Europe, the Middle East and Mexico, with an accompanying program of documentary films and an all-day conference Nov. 29 featuring talks by curators and art activists.

The first half of the exhibition has already opened at Galerie NoD, with part two opening at Galerie c2c this week. Alongside the contemporary works at NoD are three copies of illustrations by Josef Lada's for Jaroslav Hašek's The Good Soldier Švejk. These pieces, painted by Petr Motyčka of the art group Pode Bal, serve as an homage to Hašek and show the roots of local activism, as the author of Švejk was a leader of the Czech anarchist movement at the turn of the 20th century and an icon for activists.

Czech artist Eva Jiřičková teamed up with Austrian artist Kathrina Fiegl to give away free punch at a Christmas market in Vienna, an unhappy event captured on video. "Why are you provoking us with that camera?" asks one annoyed seller. Another woman is so upset by their presence that she shakes one of the artist's shoulders, shouting, "You annoy me! I annoy you! So go away!" Jiřičková and Fiegl's failed effort to bring a bit of holiday cheer is either a successful performance-art piece or a failed attempt at conflict resolution.

Another "market" video, "How Did I Change My Ideology in Pražská Tržnice" by Shlomo Yaffe from Israel, shows the artist on a shopping spree at various Vietnamese-run stands in Prague's large outdoor market in Holešovice. First Yaffe buys and dons a black T-shirt, then black pants, each time leaving his old clothes on the ground, as if he were shedding skin. After adding a bomber jacket and iron knuckles, he then buys an electric shaver and shaves his head while squatting on the sidewalk. He exits the market looking like an authentic skinhead — with all of the accoutrements provided by friendly Vietnamese vendors.

These two videos effectively show that the best political art is usually made on the streets. To underline this point, in the adjoining room there is a numbing black-and-white video of a woman wearing a white dress and jumping rope in a puddle of black paint in a gallery space, making a mess on the wall, on the ceiling and on herself.

In the same room, Austrian artist Robert Jelinek displays documentation of his conceptual project "SoS (State of Sabotage)" — a state whose territory can emerge anywhere. As part of the project, he granted SoS passports to African artists, accepting artworks in lieu of "application fees." His scheme eventually unraveled in chaos when the passports were resold as authentic travel documents to unsuspecting third parties. Still, the project deserves more of a presentation than the grid of 450 small SoS passport photos on display here.

Other noteworthy works in this second room include a series by Jan Kotík, an American with Czech roots who lives in Prague. He uses historical artifacts to show the common traits of militaristic states in financing their wars, from those of ancient empires to today's war on terrorism.

There are also abstract paintings by Russian artist Avdey Ter-Oganyan from the series "Radical Abstractions" (2004). Each of these abstract works has a provocative caption, similar to the warning on a cigarette package, such as "This work encourages consumption of narcotics and psychotropic substances" or "This work is a call to assassinate the state dignitary V. Putin with intention to terminate his political career."

The most effective political art manages to scorn or embarrass the political system in question through the use of surprise or with the type of creative subterfuge that only the art world permits. Both Kotík's series and Ter-Oganyan's "Radical Abstractions" hit the mark better than most.