Mari Laaniste (1977) is a researcher studying various forms of visual and audiovisual culture: film, animation, comics, cartoons and the interrelations of words and images in popular culture. She defended a BA (1999) and a MA (2002) degree at the Institute of Art History and Visual Culture at the Estonian Academy of Arts, and has since published research mostly on Estonian animation and fiction film. Her PhD dissertation focuses on Priit Pärn’s Soviet-era works. She teaches classes on visual culture and film at the Estonian Academy of Arts and the University of Tallinn, has edited books and organized conferences in the ongoing series “Studies in Contemporary Culture” as well as curated comics exhibitions, published some fiction and is also active as a critic.
Main publications (in English)
Books, special editions of journals
Eva Näripea, Ewa Mazierska, Mari Laaniste (toim), Kinokultura: New Russian Cinema, Special Issue 10: Estonian Cinema. 2010.
Articles
Mari Laaniste, Leena Torim, Apartment blocks and alienation: Tallinn’s Lasnamäe district as seen in the film “Autumn Ball”. – Kinokultura: New Russian Cinema, Special Issue 10: Estonian Cinema, 2010. Guest Editors: Eva Näripea, Ewa Mazierska and Mari Laaniste.
Conflicting visions: Estonia and Estonians as presented in the cinema of 1990s and 2000s. – Kinokultura: New Russian Cinema, Special Issue 10: Estonian Cinema, 2010. Guest Editors: Eva Näripea, Ewa Mazierska and Mari Laaniste.
Pushing the Limits: Priit Pärn’s Animated Cartoons and Soviet Cinema Censorship. – Eva Näripea, Andreas Trossek (toim), Via Transversa: Lost Cinema of the Former Eastern Bloc. Place and Location: Studies in Environmental Aesthetics and Semiotics VII, 2008, lk 47–55.