The conference was attended by delegates from China, California, Cyprus, the Netherlands, the UK and Ireland. Faculty and graduates of the English department participated in this intensive three day event during which the internationally renowned artist, theorist and psychoanalyst Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger gave two master classes and responded individually to each conference presentation. This was a landmark event for Maynooth University where it brought so many international scholars into dialogue with Prof Ettinger in a concentrated interdisciplinary setting. Selected essays based on conference presentations will be published.
The Subrealism Conference comprised a series of master classes and symposia run in conjunction with an exhibition called ‘Demeter Eurydice Medusa-Butterfly’ in the Illuminations Gallery which previewed Prof Ettinger’s new work in Ireland. Prof Ettinger’s work extends the work of Jacques Derrida, Luce Irigaray, Julia Kristeva, Jean-François Lyotard, Emmanuel Levinas, among others to suggest a radical re-thinking of both the subject and the human being, and it set new challenges for thinking about the relationship between aesthetic and ethical practices of literary and art practices. Her work has also had a profound impact on scholars in a diverse range of fields including English Literature, gender studies, psychoanalysis, theatre and performance studies, sexuality studies, film studies, philosophy, visual theory, queer theory, theology, psychosocial studies, political theory, among others.
Event organisers: Dr Moynagh Sullivan (Maynooth University Department of English), Dr Tina Kinsella, Michael O'Rourke