Ilona Jurkonytė
Texts
Image Production and Curation
Other Explorations
I am a film and media researcher, film curator, and Marie
Skłodowska-Curie Actions / UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of St Andrews.
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© Ilona Jurkonytė. All Rights Reserved.
Ilona Jurkonytė —
Bio
I am a film and media researcher, film curator, and Marie
Skłodowska-Curie Actions / UKRI Postdoctoral Fellow at the School of Modern
Languages, University of St Andrews, and a member of the St Andrews Centre for
Exoplanet Science (UK). Previously, I held an Arts & Science Postdoctoral
Fellowship at the Cinema Studies Institute, University of Toronto (Canada), a
Vilnius University Foundation Fellowship (Lithuania), and was a Vanier Scholar
at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, Concordia University (Canada).
My research is situated at the intersection of film and
media studies and moving image curation. I study how cinema production and
exhibition infrastructures, and transnational flows of resources shape
contemporary screen cultures. My work examines moving-image cultures focusing on
how audiovisual technologies mediate relationships between environments,
institutions, and audiences.
My current and recent projects analyze localized impacts of the
global mergers in film exhibition sector, theorize nuclear media archives, explore
cinematic representations of outer space research, and investigate the environmental
change as interconnected sites of media production, circulation, and
governance. Throughout my research projects, I analyze how moving images travel
across national borders, institutional frameworks, exhibition circuits, and infrastructures.
A recurring focus of my work is the relationship between national screen
cultures and transnational media flows, including questions of cultural policy,
archival preservation, exhibition networks, public funding, and the circulation
of film and media across regional and international contexts.
My research is informed by experience in film exhibition,
festival management, and curation. Prior to my academic work, I participated
extensively within the screen sector, initiating the exhibition and
distribution projects in film festival, cinema theatre, and contemporary art cinema
contexts. I was the co-founder (2007), managing director (2007–2012), and
artistic director (2007–2019) of the Kaunas International Film Festival
(Lithuania), which played a key role in rescuing Romuva Cinema (Lithuania). In
2012, I was invited to enhance the presence of moving image at the Contemporary
Art Centre (Lithuania), where from 2012 to 2014 I oversaw the establishment of
the CAC Cinema space and curated its film program.
My academic and artistic (film curatorial) research
combine an interest in how cinema industries, infrastructures, and institutions
shape the production, circulation, preservation, and reception of moving images
across local, regional, and transnational contexts.
Areas of expertise:
Cinema Industry Studies
Cinema Infrastructures and Media Archaeology
Transnational Screen Cultures
Film Production Cultures and Exhibition Networks
Film and Media Policy, and Governance
Environmental Film and Media Studies
Science, Technology, and Media Studies
Film Circulation and Distribution
Film Festivals and Exhibition Studies
Nuclear Cinema and Media Cultures
Outer Space and Media Cultures
Decolonial and Anticolonial Film and Media Studies
Film and Moving Image Curation
Selected Grants & Fellowships
2025 Marie Skłodowska
Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowship at the School of Modern Languages and the
St Andrews Centre for Exoplanet Science at the University of St Andrews, UK
2024 Arts & Science
Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Cinema Studies Institute, University of
Toronto, Canada
2023 Vilnius
University Foundation Fellowship, Lithuania
2020 Art Production Grant –
Lithuanian Cultural Council, Lithuania: moving image work Arabidopsis
Thaliana
2015 Vanier
Canada Graduate Scholarship, Canada
2014 Residency
for Film Industry Professionals: Nipkow Program, Germany
EducationPhD in Film and Moving Image Studies, Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada
MA in Art History and Theory, Vilnius Academy of Fine Arts, Faculty of Humanities, Department of Art History and Theory, Vilnius, Lithuania
MA in Communication, Vytautas Magnus University, Institute of Political Science and Diplomacy, Department of Journalism, Kaunas, Lithuania
BA in Practical Philosophy, Vytautas Magnus University, Faculty of Humanities, Department of Philosophy, Kaunas, Lithuania
Memberships
Member – European Network for Cinema and Media
Studies
Member
– Feminist Media Studio, Concordia University, Canada
Member – Global Emergent Media Lab, Concordia University, Canada
Member – Media–Infrastructure–Environment Reading Group, Simon Fraser University, Canada
Member – St Andrews Centre for Exoplanet Science, University of St Andrews, Scotland, UK
Member – Association of Cinema Culture,
Lithuania
Member
– Society of Cinema and Media Studies
ij32@st-andrews.ac.uk