Art/Sport talk: Kinchen

Art Initiative and Sport Initiative presents: an Art/Sport talk with artist and director Måns Månsson, former sport commentator Lasse Kinch, and producer Johan Kleberg. They will talk to us about the film Kinchen, the Hockey World Championship of 1989, and the commercialization of broadcasting television. Join us on Wednesday, March 12, at 12:15-13:00 in the Cabinet Room.

Start time: 2025-03-12 at 12:15

End time: 2025-03-12 at 13:00

In the film Kinchen (“The Kinch”) from 2005, Swedish sport commentator Lasse Kinch attends the Hockey World Championships in the Czech Republic. In this Cinéma Vérité* styled documentary, artist and filmmaker Måns Månsson captures the everyday life of “The Kinch” between the games.

As the first commercial channel to broadcast in Sweden, Norway and Denmark, TV3 showed the championships. TV3 was launched on December 31, 1987, and was transmitted from London to circumvent legislation that prohibited advertising on Swedish television.

In 1989, TV3 bought the rights to broadcast the Ice Hockey World Championships. This created major headlines in Swedish newspapers, as very few Swedes had access to TV3 at the time, whereas the interest in ice hockey was high. People were outraged by the fact that they now had to pay to watch the games as broadcasting, especially of sports and the championships, were generally considered to belong to public service.

Lars, Lasse, Kinch (b. 1943) is a famous Swedish sports journalist working with TV and radio. He was recruited by TV3, after having worked many years in public service radio, a move that sparked a controversy which Kinch carried with him throughout his career.

Måns Månsson (b. 1982) is an award-winning director and cinematographer educated at the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm. His film Kinchen was nominated for the Guldbaggen for Best Documentary Film.

The film was produced by SSE alumn Johan Kleberg for Acne. Klerbeg (b. 1975) began his career in TV and was appointed CEO for several Swedish TV-channels such as ZTV, TV4, and C More. He is since 2014 acting in the book- and publishing industry.

*Cinéma Vérité, sometimes called observational cinema, is a style of film where the filmmaker acts like a fly on the wall, the intention being to represent the truth as objectively as possible.