Welcome back to our BAIS PGR bursary prize winners blog post series. Each year we ask our bursary prize winners to write up a short post on how they spent their bursary funds. This year we begin with Alice Reffin (University of Oxford), for whom the BAIS bursary supported the development of her DPhil through archival visits:

The bursary funded two trips to Dublin, enabling me to conduct primary research for the third chapter of my DPhil, which looks at the role of visual culture during the 75^th Anniversary of the Easter Rising in 1991, focusing particularly on an art exhibition at Kilmainham Gaol, ‘In A State’. meaning that I was able to receive valuable feedback on my research project. The BAIS grant enabled me to stay for four days and so I was able to view a variety of panels relevant to my research, directing to me towards useful resources and concepts to enrich my project.

My first trip consisted of two days at the National Archives in Dublin, where I examined records from the Department of the Taoiseach and the Office of the Secretary to the President. This research provided revealing insight into the Government’s hesitancy in compiling a programme of commemorative events amidst the ongoing conflict in Northern Ireland. However, not long after returning to Oxford, I discovered a new set of relevant archival material – the National Library of Ireland held a collection of papers on the ‘In A State’ exhibition. The bursary provided me with the financial flexibility to be able to return to Dublin for the second time in just a month, for a two-day visit to the National Library of Ireland’s archive. This research trip was hugely valuable, the collection was extensive and provided crucial information on the conception of the exhibition, its financing and visitor numbers, and the process of each artist – from initial proposal to final artist’s statements.

The time and flexibility provided by the bursary enabled me to follow the lead of my research, as it expanded beyond my original expectations. In turn, this has enabled a deeper and more expansive analysis of the 75^th Anniversary than initially anticipated, which will hopefully contribute towards a successful DPhil project, and the future potential for publication as a book. In the meantime, I hope to present this research at seminars and conferences.

Alice is a DPhil student at Wolfson College, University of Oxford, researching the construction and commemoration of identity in 20^th and 21^st century Ireland, with a particular focus on visual culture. She is also a Research Associate for Contested Histories in Public Spaces, which examines contestations over statues, monuments and other physical representations of historical legacies in public spaces.

Image is of the painting The Arrest by Kathleen Fox (1916).