EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME PARTICIPANTS

Diāna Dimza-Dimme

Diāna Dimza-Dimme

Artist and art educator Diāna Dimza-Dimme (1964) has graduated from the Department of Textile Art of the Latvian Academy of Arts (1992). She regularly organizes solo exhibitions both in Latvia and abroad, as well as participates in group exhibitions and various interdisciplinary art projects. The most recent of them are: Field of Wishes ("Vēlmju lauks") together with Ieva Krūmiņa at the Cēsis Concert Hall (2017), solo exhibitions Darkness is never dark ("Tumsa nekad nav tumša") at Jurmala Artist House (2016) and Miriam from Mangaļsala (Mirjama no Mangaļsalas) at Žanis Lipke Memorial (2015). Even though educated as a textile artist, in her cerative work she uses not only diverse textile techniques, but also drawings, photography archives, collages, installations etc. Since 2010 Diana Dimza-Dimme works as an art educator at Latvian National Museum of Art.
Vika Eksta

Vika Eksta

Vika Eksta (1987) is a visual artist who lives and works in Riga. She studied photography in Andrejs Grants` photo studio and at the EFTI School of Photography (Madrid). She has a BA in Film Theory and an MA in Visual Communication from the Art Academy of Latvia. Since 2014, her works have been included in exhibitions both in Latvia and abroad. In 2016, she received the ADC award Young Guns and the Award for Young Baltic Photographers at the Riga Photography Biennial.
Reinis Hofmanis

Reinis Hofmanis

Reinis Hofmanis (1985) is an artist who works in the medium of photography. He studied photography at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Hannover, Germany (2007) and graduated with MA from the Department of Visual Communication at the Art Academy of Latvia (2012). He has been participating in exhibitions since 2003. The artist`s works are characterised by a socio-anthropologic perspective which is manifested in his interest in the typologisation of various social groups, their models of behaviour, and the environment they have created or affected. The resulting photographs are gathered and collected, with projects transforming into long-term series. Hofmanis won the Archifoto Prize in 2012 and was awarded 2nd place in the Professional competition category of Architecture of the Sony World Photography Awards in 2013. His works have been published in New York Times, Financial Times, Spiegel, Esquire, Bloomberg, Le Monde, The Globe and Mail and The British Journal of Photography, among others.
Anton Holzer

Dr. Anton Holzer

Dr. Anton Holzer (1964) is a photo historian, author and curator based in Vienna. He studied history, political science and philosophy at the universities of Innsbruck, Bologna and Vienna. His field of research and his publications encompass numerous areas, amongst others the history of war photography, the history of photojournalism and the history of Austrian and German photography. Since 2001 Holzer has been editor of the journal Fotogeschichte – Beiträge zur Geschichte und Ästhetik der Fotografie and he teaches history and theory of photography at universities in Krems, Vienna und Luzern. He has published several books, contributes to catalogues and is also an avid critic and publicist.
Ivars Ījabs

Ivars Ījabs

Ivars Ījabs (1972) is a political scientist and publicist, associate professor and researcher at University of Latvia. He has studied music, philosophy and political science, and also works outside the academic environment. He is an expert on issues of societal self-organisation and political culture, regularly publishing serious and less serious articles on these questions. He has taken part in the development of political and communication strategies, written speeches and been an intellectual sparring partner for takers of nationally significant decisions. His latest book in Latvian, Politikas teorija: pirmie soļi [Political Theory: First Steps] was published by Lasītava. He is a corresponding member of the Latvian Academy of Sciences.
Anna Kaisa Rastenberger

Anna Kaisa Rastenberger

Anna Kaisa Rastenberger (1971) holds a PhD in Art History from the University of Helsinki. In 2016 she was appointed the Professor of Exhibition Studies and Spatiality at Academy of Fine Arts, University of the Arts Helsinki. Rastenberger has previously worked as a Chief Curator in the Finnish Museum of Photography, as a researcher in the Academy of Finland`s research project, as an educational curator at The Helsinki Art Museum and as the editor-in- chief of KUVA – the magazine of visual culture. She is a popular guest lecturer in several universities and art institutions in Europe.
Laine Kristberga

Laine Kristberga

Laine Kristberga (1980) is a media researcher, art historian and publicist, a PhD candidate at the Art Academy of Latvia. Her doctor`s dissertation is about performance art in Latvia in the 1970s. She acquired her present academic degree with honours in London (Birkbeck, University of London). Currently she is working as a lecturer in several universities in Latvia, including Rīga Stradiņš University, RISEBA, Riga Business School and Turiba University. Kristberga is the author of many scholarly articles, both in Latvian and English. Her works have been published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing and Taylor & Francis Group, among others. She leads and coordinates an interdisciplinary research group at the Nordic Summer University. Her research interests are: media synthesis and hybridisation, appropriation and the impact of socio-political context on art.
Adams Mazurs

Adam Mazur

Adam Mazur (1977) works as a freelance curator and editor-in- chief of BLOK magazine. He is assistant professor at the University of Arts in Poznan and author of the books Histories of Photography in Poland 1839-2009 (2010), New Phenomena in Polish Photography after 2000 (2012), Depth of Field. Essays on Polish Photography After 1945 (2014), After the End of Photography (2018). He has curated several group and solo shows in Poland and abroad. Among recent individual exhibitions are shows by Martha Rosler (2014), Pawel Althamer (2015), Artur Zmijewski (2016), Aneta Grzeszykowska (2017). He is currently working on a book on Central European photography.
Vytautas Michelkevičius

Vytautas Michelkevičius

Vytautas Michelkevičius (1981) is a curator, publisher, art and media researcher, and Associate Professor at Vilnius Academy of Arts and Vilnius University. He holds a PhD in communication studies (his thesis was on Critical media theory and photography) from Vilnius University. He is interested in the photographicallity of art and society, socializing through art, interdisciplinarity between art and research, artistic research, experimental teaching, and participatory curatorial practices. Since 2002 Vytautas has authored or edited more than 10 catalogues and books on media theory, art and photography. He curates mostly group shows and in 2015 he was a curator of the Lithuanian Pavilion at the Venice Art Biennale with artist Dainius Liškevičius’s project Museum.
Dr. Agnė Narušytė

Dr. Agnė Narušytė

Dr. Agnė Narušytė (1970) is a critic, curator and researcher interested in contemporary photography and its links with philosophy, history and art. She studied history and theory of art at the Vytautas Magnus University (Kaunas), Central European University (Prague) and read MA in film studies at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (United Kingdom). She defended her PhD thesis at Vilnius Academy of Arts in 2005. In 1997 – 2009 Narušytė curated the collection of modern photography at the Lithuanian Art Museum, taught at the Vilnius Academy of Arts and Edinburgh Napier University (United Kingdom). In 2009–2014 Narušytė was the head of the Department of History and Theory of Art at Vilnius Academy of Arts. Currently she is associated professor at the same academy and the editor of cultural weekly 7 meno dienos. In 2008, she published a book The Aesthetics of Boredom in Lithuanian Photography based on her PhD thesis.
Ilva Skulte

Ilva Skulte

Researcher of visual communication Dr. philol. Ilva Skulte (1968) graduated from the Faculty of Philology at the University of Latvia. She is currently associate professor at the Department of Communication Studies at Rīga Stradiņš University and Head of the RSU Master`s Study Programme in Communication and Media Studies. For several years (2005 - 2010) Skulte was on the editorial board of the newspaper Kultūras Forums [Culture Forum] and she is the author of many academic and media publications, having written about literature, culture and society. Her research focuses on the transformations of media logic in the context of development of the new media and their role in society, especially in culture.
Ilmārs Šlāpins

Ilmārs Šlāpins

Ilmārs Šlāpins (1968) is a publicist, philosopher, writer and translator, editor of the magazine Rīgas Laiks since 1993 and editor-in- chief of the internet magazine Satori. Has worked in radio as well. Šlāpins is regularly published in Latvian media, and is the author of several books, poetry collections and plays.
Margus Tamm

Margus Tamm

Margus Tamm (1977) lives and works in Tallinn as an artist, designer and cultural critic. He studied graphic arts and interdisciplinary arts in the Estonian Academy of Arts and is currently a PhD candidate at the Institute of Art History and Visual Culture. His research field is connected to the methods of tactical media and the function of the collective author.
Katrīna Teivāne-Korpa

Katrīna Teivāne-Korpa

Katrīna Teivāne-Korpa (1978) holds a PhD from the Art Academy of Latvia with her thesis The Development of Art Photography in Latvia and the Legacy of Roberts Johansons (1877-1959). In her everyday job she is a bibliographer in the Konrāds Ubāns Art Reading Room at the National Library of Latvia. She has been writing about photography and art since 2007.
Alise Tifentale

Alise Tifentale

Alise Tifentale (1977) is an art and photography historian, writer, editor, occasional curator and educator. Her research and writing deals with two main topics: global issues in postwar photography, and image sharing in today`s social media such as Instagram. In addition she has written extensively about the history of art and photography in Latvia, the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Born in Latvia, she is currently based in the New York City area and is a research fellow at the Cultural Analytics Lab led by Lev Manovich, as well as a PhD candidate in art history at the Graduate Center, City University of New York. Tifentale co-curated the pavilion of Latvia at the 55th Venice Art Biennale (2013). She is the founder of the magazine Foto Kvartals and was its editor-in- chief (2006-2011). She is the author of the book The Photograph as Art in Latvia, 1960-1969 (2011), and her articles have appeared in journals such as CAA.Reviews, PhotoResearcher, Networking Knowledge, ARTMargins, Russian Art & Culture, and others.
Annika Toots

Annika Toots

Annika Toots (1985) lives and works in Tallinn and Lääne Country, Estonia. She graduated from the Institute of Art History and Visual Culture at the Estonian Academy of Arts and is currently a PhD candidate at the same institution. Her research is focused on the complex relationship between visual culture and memory, with a particular interest in photography. She has written scholarly articles on memory and photography in post-Soviet Estonian art. She has curated art and book exhibitions; her latest projects include an interview book Artists & Spaces (2017) about the studio spaces of contemporary Estonian artists, and an exhibition project Failure/Afterlife (2017) which focuses on the afterlife of artworks and studio remnants. She has been giving lectures on photography, trauma and artistic activism, contemporary studio practices and other topics at the Estonian Academy of Arts; currently she is editor at the Estonian Contemporary Art Development Center.
Ramona Umblija

Ramona Umblija

Ramona Umblija (1950) is an art historian, public figure and government official (director of the Latvian Culture Foundation (1993 - 1997), Minister of Culture of the Republic of Latvia (1997 - 1998)). She is currently working at the State Heraldry Commission (Chancellery of the President of Latvia). In 1975 she graduated from the Department of Art History and Theory at the Art Academy of Latvia. She worked as editor-in- chief of the magazine Māksla [Art] (1973 - 1986), and has been a member of the Artists` Union of Latvia since 1981. Her research is specialised in the field of applied, or design graphics. She was the curator of Public Mirrors, an exhibition of Latvian posters (2007) and an exhibition dedicated to twenty years of the Latvian currency, the lat. Umblija is editor of the book Plakāts Latvijā [The Poster in Latvia] (2008) and has also authored a book on the design and designers of Latvian money (2013).
Kaspars Zellis

Kaspars Zellis

Kaspars Zellis (1972) is a historian and leading researcher at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology at the University of Latvia. His research and writing has focused on the propaganda of the Nazi occupation regime in Latvia during the war, interactions between collective memory and history, their representations in life stories of the residents of Latvia. In 2012, his book Ilūziju un baiļu mašinērija. Propaganda nacistu okupētajā Latvijā: vara, mediji un sabiedrība (1941 - 1945) [Machinery of Illusion and Fear. Propaganda in Nazi-occupied Latvia: Power, Media and Society (1941 - 1945)] was published by Mansards. He also works as a publicist, writing about subjects that include race, ethnicity, propaganda and others (portal Satori.lv, magazine Rīgas Laiks and others); he has worked as a teacher and lecturer at different Latvian institutions of higher education and regularly takes part in public discussions about socio-political and historical subjects.