Laine Kristberga, PhD, serves as an expert for the Latvian and Lithuanian Research Councils and is a researcher and Head of the Arts Department at the Institute of Literature, Folklore and Art of the University of Latvia. She is also Associate Professor at the Faculty of Education Sciences and Psychology of the University of Latvia, where she heads the Arts Section and directs the Master’s programme Process Design in Art and Culture.
Alongside her academic work, Kristberga leads the non-governmental cultural organisation Latvian Centre for Performance Art and is the director and curator of the Riga Performance Art Festival STARPTELPA (https://www.rigaperformancefestival.com/). She oversees a range of international arts and cultural projects focused on mentoring emerging artists, enhancing the international visibility of Latvian artists and fostering cultural diplomacy.
Her research focuses on the history and political dimensions of visual and performance art in Latvia and the wider Baltic region, particularly during the Cold War. Her forthcoming monograph, History and Genealogy of Performance Art in Latvia, will be published by Routledge in 2026. The book offers the first comprehensive study of the history of performance art in Latvia from the 1960s to the late 1980s under Soviet occupation, bringing into focus artistic practices that have remained marginal in both international historiography and Latvian art-historical discourse.