Fraser Cattini

Avant-Garde Ireland

Biography

I completed my undergraduate degree at the University of Liverpool before embarking on the MPhil in Irish Writing at Trinity College, Dublin. Under the supervision of Prof Sam Slote I completed my dissertation entitled ‘Navigating Networks: The Modernist Literary Links of Thomas MacGreevy’ before returning to Liverpool to begin my doctorate degree.

Research

My research aims to utilise an interdisciplinary approach to investigate the impact of the visual arts on modernist writing. I am particularly interested in how Irish writers’ contact with European avant-garde movements influences their work. More specifically, my thesis explores James Joyce’s exposure to Dada; Samuel Beckett’s friendship with Alberto Giacometti; and Elizabeth Bowen’s cubist influences. Despite the controversy surrounding avant-garde art in Ireland during the first half of the twentieth century, my work aims to demonstrate the profound impact that modernist European movements and visual artists exerted on Irish writers.