Lars Kristensen

Background
I have an MA (European Civilization) and an MPhil (Slavonic Languages) from the University of Glasgow and in 2010 I completed a PhD (Film Studies) at the University of St. Andrews.
After a couple of years as a post-doc research associate at the University of Central Lancashire, I started my position in 2013 as Lecturer in Media Art, Aesthetics and Narration at the University of Skövde. As part of this position, I teach on a range of course within game development and I am a course administrator on Dramaturgy, Film history and Academic writing. I also supervise and examine thesis dissertation on both graduate and postgraduate levels.
My research focuses on the theory of moving images, which includes computer games. My approach is analytical and historical, examining both the visual representation and the industry that produces the images. My primary research interest has to a large extend been on Russian and Eastern European cinemas, where I have published on films from Russia, Polen, Estonia, Latvia and Albania and, more broadly, on the condition of postcommunism as reflected in cinema. In this regard, I serve as editorial board member of the journal Studies in Eastern European Cinema and I have given numerous conference papers and organized panels on this topic.
A second strand to my research is on the aesthetics of the bicycle in cinema, which sprang from a long-term interested in the intersection between cinema and the bicycle. Both technologies appear 'complete' at the same time in the 1890s and they require the same level of speed to work as machines – cinema to simulate movement and the bicycle to defy gravity. This is a niche field that is in relatively early stages of development, but it is growing rapidly as amateur filmmaking converges on bicycle aficionado and green ideology, making bicycle cinema a distinct feature of digital economy.
Issues of ideology lead to a third aspect in my research, which centres on Marxism and the moving image. This has led me to develop a research interest in computer games, since game studies places a greater emphasis on technology – on platform, mechanics and computer performance – than more traditional media does. My interest is on the ideology of games as conditioned on the interaction with the game machine. Marxist analysis can be useful in this regard to unpick the technological interaction between game and gamer. Currently my research is on interpellation of ideology and the role of critiques in an interactive consumption of digital media.
In 2015, I organized together with colleagues and curators the exhibition Art and Game Obstruction (2015) at Skövde Art Museum, which centred round games and art. The exhibition saw artists, curators and various LARPers interacting with the students, which is something that I would like to develop in the future. The aim is to work cross-disciplinary at the intersection of art and technology and I am currently working together with two contemporary artists, Olle Essvik and Lina Persson, in order to develop an appropriated experimental platform for such a clash of ideas and intensions.
Fortcoming publications
Edited collection: Third Cinema and Marxism, Bloomsbury 2018 (Co-edited with Ewa Mazierska)
Forskning
2023
Studies in Eastern European Cinema
2023. Artikel, editorial.
https://doi.org/10.1080/2040350X.2023.2149122
Studies in Eastern European Cinema
2023. Artikel, editorial. https://doi.org/10.1080/2040350X.2022.2159161
Reset: Politicia e Videogiochi
2023. Kapitel i bok.
2022
KinoKultura
2022. Artikel.
KinoKultura
2022. Artikel.
KinoKultura
2022. Artikel, forskningsöversikt.
2021
KinoKultura
2021. Artikel, recension.
KinoKultura
2021. Artikel, recension.
2020
Film Studies
2020. Artikel, recension. https://doi.org/10.7227/FS.21.0009
KinoKultura
2020. Artikel, recension.