Jan Inge Reilstad

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Jan Inge Reilstad

Jan Inge Reilstad (born 1963 in Mosjøen, grew up in Stavanger) is a Norwegian essayist and critic living in Sandnes. He studied literature at the university in Bergen. His dissertation from 1998 entitled Georg Johannesen og dannelsen: Høst i mars (Georg Johannesen and Enlightenment: Autumn in March), had the work of the norwegian writer and professor in rhetorics Georg Johannesen as it’s main subject, with close and distant reading of his early novel Høst i mars (Autumn in March, 1957).

Reilstad has been working with the different art forms and popular culture regarding to their public role, function, use and effects. Other keywords for his work might be problems connected with formation, identity, creativity, instrumentation, planning and development of culture, interdiciplinary studies, institutional criticism, exeeding genres, aesthetic of imperfection and the impure, Relational Aesthetics and art practise, canon debate, reception theory, literacy, text cultures in the information age, cultural complexity - and Basque culture.

He has published SamtidslyrikkEN - fra Almuens Opera til Gatas Parlament, an anthology of the youngest norwegian song lyrics; chansons, pop lyrics, rock poetry and rap. In 2004 he published Broken Column - Art + City, on the sitespesific installation ”Broken Column”, by the english artist and sculptor Antony Gormley. The installation was opened in 2003, existing of 23 sculptures all over the city centre of Stavanger.

In 1999 came Prøvebilleder - Om sansning, kritikk og kunstnerrolle hos en Kielland, an Artist's book made together with the visual artists Susanne Christensen and Helene Selvåg. In the period from 2000-2005 Reilstad was editor of Localmotives, a scandinavian netmagazine on contemporary art and culture. Localmotives was honored by Culturenet Norway as the best Internet site on art in 2001. Besides Reilstad Localmotives consists of artists Geir Egil Bergjord, Susanne Christensen and Helene Selvåg, and they practise as a group of artists and curators as well, with performance, happenings and exhibitions in the Stavanger region.

Reilstad has been working as a critic and essayist in different norwegian magazines and newspapers since the middle of the 1990s. He is an active debater of society, member of the norwegian non-fiction association (Norsk faglitterær forfatter- og oversetterforening) as well as the norwegian association of critics (Norsk Kritikerlag). Reilstad works as an adviser and planner for different institutions in the field of culture in Norway. 1999-2001 he was project director for Sandnes2000, the millenium festivitas in Sandnes. He has been responsible for a series of international conferences on art, cities and urban culture.

In the period from 2005-2008 he is working with the swedish artist and professor Jörgen Svensson as a curator and project director on a large scale art project regarding Stavanger as european capital of culture in 2008, entitled Nabolagshemmeligheter / Neighbourhood Secrets.

[edit] Bibliography

SamtidslyrikkEN - fra Almuens Opera til Gatas Parlament; Damm Publishing House, 2004.
Broken Column - Byen + Kunsten; Wigestrand Publishing House, 2004.
Broken Column - Art + City; Wigestrand Publishing House, 2004.
Prøvebilleder - Om sansning, kritikk og kunstnerrolle hos en Kielland; SanseseansE, 1999.
Georg Johannesen og dannelsen: Høst i mars; Dissertation, UiB, 1998.