An artist researcher and writer with a PhD and an MA from the Department of Fine Art, Art History and Cultural Studies at the University of Leeds and a BA (Hons) in the History of Art, Design and Film with a minor degree in Creative Writing from Sheffield Hallam University, Ola Ståhl’s main field of research lies at the intersection between ethico-aesthetics, transversality and politics, and in particular between creative and critical practices, especially collaborative ones, including creative-critical and art writing practices, experimental publishing practices and critical event- and dialogue based practices. He has exhibited and performed internationally since the late 1990s and published several chapbooks and artist’s books alongside articles, essays and prose texts in various journals, collections and anthologies.
For three years, starting in 2001, he was part of the editorial collective of the international Cultural Studies journal Parallax and between 2001 and 2008 he served as the main instigator behind and coordinator of the London-based artist collective C.CRED [Collective CREative Dissent]. Following the cessation of the activities of C.CRED, he initiated and coordinated the activities of the alternative, experimental publishing platform Publication Studio Malmö, focusing on what might be described as the social and cultural, and essentially collaborative, nature of publishing and dissemination.
Between 2003 and 2008 he worked as an Associate Lecturer on the Fine Art programme at Central Saint Martin’s College of Art and Design and the Design Cultures programme at London College of Communication, both colleges within the University of the Arts, London. Since 2013 he has been a Senior Lecturer in Design at Linnaeus University in Sweden, where he was also part of the management of the Department of Design, 2015-2020.