dr. Ivo Blom

Research areas

My current research includes foremost an intermedial study on Luchino Visconti & Visual Culture (painting, photography, cinema). It deals with image migration & appropriation, framing, mirrors, pictures in sets, etc. I lately lectured on my Visconti & visual arts research at the NECS conference in Budapest, Hungary (June 2008) and at the Puccini & Cinema conference in Torre del Lago (August 2008). In 2010, I will lecture on Visconti at the conference Iconology Meets Film: Netherlandish Art & Film (University Utrecht).

Other research topics are research in film & art; programming and reception in the Netherlands; cinema & graphic design; early cinema. In July 2009 I will give the paper 'Moving Pictures: on image travel across art & media' (Rome). Autumn 2009 I will give a paper on early Dutch actuality films, at the conference Imagining Amsterdam: Visions and revisions (University of Amsterdam).

The University of Amsterdam has put my Dutch-written dissertation (2000) on Jean Desmet & the early Dutch film trade and cinema exhibition online. The English-written edition, Jean Desmet and the Early Dutch Film Trade (AUP 2003) is still for sale, both as paperback and hardcover. See also the section Books on this site.


Editorial activities

Since 2004, I am in the editorial board of TMG (Tijdschrift voor Mediageschiedenis), journal on media history. In the past I co-edited two special issues of TMG, one on Games & History (2004) with Connie Veugen and one on Cinema in Context (2006) with Wanda Strauven. Both issues can be consulted online here. See also my section Books & volumes for the Games issue and the Cinema Context issue. Before I also collaborated with Jong Holland, journal on art & visual culture.

Teaching activities

Since September 2008, I am coordinator of the MA Comparative Arts & Media Studiesat my own department, which focuses on intermediality, narrativity, visual arts & media, and crossmedia storytelling, and in which cinema is prominently represented. Within the MA, I am giving a seminar on Film & Art, related to my own research on Visconti & visual arts. I also lecture within the BA: Film History; Research Practice of Film & Graphic Design (with Rieta Bergsma & various guest lecturers); and Film Analysis. In 2009, I will also design a new course in the MA: Intermedialities: Context, Practices & Institutions.

For a more detailed overview of my past and current research, see the list at the left of this page. See also www.metis.vu.nl

Exploratory workshop

In June 2009, I will co-organize an international exploratory workshop on intermediality, funded by ESF (European Science Foundation). This workshop explores possible research programmes together with not only European universities, but also policy makers and museum & exhibition curators. The workshop takes place 12-14 June at De Rode Hoed, Amsterdam; access is by invitation only.