Belfast east – Page 6 – Paddy Duffy Collection

The Pitt Stop

2024-12-292025-01-13Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The Pitt Stop caravan is a new community-services centre run by the Residents’ Association (Fb) in Pitt Park, east Belfast, a stone’s throw from the Ballymac Friendship Centre (Fb). The relationship between the two is unclear – this Sunday World article quotes one person as saying the some residents felt themselves excluded from the Centre and that the “good people of Pitt Park” need “access to a facility”. The article also suggests possible connections to the local UVF and to drug-dealing; the Association denounced the write-up in a brief Facebook post.

The Park itself was renovated in 2024 (Belfast Live before | after).

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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Hair Style

2024-12-292025-01-15Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This is an older piece but one seen only on weekends and in the evenings because it is painted on shutters, specifically the shutters of DC-Rays (formerly D-Rays) hair salon (Fb) in Albertbridge Road, east Belfast.

The work was painted by Glen Molloy (ig) c. 2017; for other pieces in this style, see the gallery of ten famous faces in Corporation Street from 2016 or the Three Jimmys in Exchange Place from 2017.

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The Ledley Hall

2024-12-242025-07-16Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This is a repainting of the Ledley Hall/Queen’s Jubilee mural at the junction with Kingswood Street, part of the 2016 re-imaging of Lord Street, east Belfast, sponsored by the Housing Executive and CharterNI. The mural shows the hall past and present and features local figures Bob Yarr (OBE), Eddie Witherspoon, John Cross (BEM), John Currans, Sam Rainey, and Reggie Morrow.

The ‘Lord Street Remembers’ piece is from 2015, by Glenn Black and Ken Maze of Blaze FX (web).

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Copyright © 2023 Paddy Duffy
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In Defence Of Our Country

2024-11-062024-12-07Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Privates Fred Starrett and James Cummings died in an IRA bombing on Belfast’s Royal Avenue on February 24th, 1988, two of the 197 UDR soldiers who died violently during the twenty-two year life-span of the regiment (UDR Association). The pair are also remembered in a UDR display in Thorndyke Street.

The poem on the right hand side (“as poppy petals gently fall …” by John Potter) is the same as on the Parkhall (Antrim) UDR board.

Ogilvie Street, east Belfast – compare the entry on the same wall from September.

“This project was completed through Belfast City Council’s ‘Promoting the Positive Expression of Cultural Heritage’ Programme, with funding through the EU Programme for Peace & Reconciliation in Northern Ireland and the Border Region of Ireland (PEACE III) under Priority 1.1. Building Positive Relations at a local level.”

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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On Hyndford Street

2024-09-212024-10-31Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Van Morrison was born in 1945 at 125 Hyndford Street in east Belfast and recalled the sights and sounds of his early life there in the spoken-word track ‘On Hyndford Street’ from the 1991 album Hymns To The Silence (youtube). (The song also concluded his 70th birthday concert in Cyprus Avenue – youtube).

This painted tribute is by Glen Molloy (Fb) in the alley between Abetta Parade and Hyndford Street, roughly behind 135 Hyndford Street (and close to The Hollow – see Days When The Rains Came).

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Cosy Somme Association

2024-09-182024-09-29Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Compared to the image (from 2021) seen in The Sacrifice Remains The Same, a blue background and a new wall of Poppy Trail plaques (for the Poppy Trail see this 2017 entry on the board) have been added to the Cosy Somme Association’s tribute to British Army soldiers from the 36th (Ulster) Division in WWI and the modern-day Royal Irish Regiment. (See also the image in Alain Miossec’s collection from earlier this year.)

Ogilvie Street, east Belfast, with a bonus image below of the milkman just around the corner, next to Piccola Parma.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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Quoth The Raven, “Evermore”

2024-07-252024-08-01Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

A new board was unveiled on July 1st 2024, by the 1st Raven Somme Society and The Loyal (Fb) at the Raven social club (Fb), putting together the Ulster Tower (see e.g. A Thought Is Not A Lot), JP Beadle’s painting of the 36th going ‘over the top’ (see The Trenches Have Vanished Under The Ploughs) and Wilfrid Spender’s famous quote about the first day of the Battle Of The Somme (see I Would Rather Be An Ulsterman).

This board takes the place of the King Charles board (seen previously in Long Live The King), which has been moved to the other side of Castlereagh Street and joined by the board that it replaced, to Queen Elizabeth (both on top of some old (2012) panels depicting east Belfast of yesteryear – see Shipyard Workers).

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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The Rocker

2024-05-272024-09-25Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The cover Jim Fitzpatrick did in 1973 for Thin Lizzy’s ‘Vagabonds Of The Western World’ album was reproduced in 2024 in east Belfast as a tribute to local guitarist Eric Bell (the middle figure). There is video of Bell playing the solo to ‘The Rocker’ in Berlin the week of the album’s launch, in September, 1973 (youtube). Bell – aged 22 – left the band at the end of the year, a few months after the release of ‘Vagabonds’ (WP). He currently lives in Co Down (BelTel).

By Blaze FX (web) Woodstock Road at Jocelyn Avenue. Tom McClean has video of the launch (youtube).

The album is also one of the cassette tapes featured in Back On The Streets further along the Woodstock Road. There is also a Thin Lizzy mural in Bangor.

There is a Visual History page on The Influence Of Jim Fitzpatrick on muraling.

Spinning Memories

2024-05-122024-08-27Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The inspiration for this new piece of street art by KMG (ig) was the Strand Spinning Mill (formerly the Jaffe Spinning Mill) which closed in 1983 and is now the Portview Trade Centre. During WWI the mill made munitions and during WWII viscose rayon. The film Lint And Linen (youtube) covers both pre-industrial and mechanical linen-production (though mostly focused on yarn from line fibres rather than from tow, which was the Strand mill’s claim to fame (Duffy Rafferty)); the painting appears to present a more primitive and imaginary age in which fibres could be spun using the human hand.

For photographs of the old mill on the Trade Centre, see previously the image of A Block in Strand Spinning Mill.

“Spinning memories” is the name of a planned collection of stories for an archive at Portview (Portview Stories).

Townsley Street, east Belfast, next to the White Witch and facing Aslan Is On The Move.

Entwined

2024-05-052024-08-27Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Belgian artist Kitsune Jolene (web) came to Belfast in the days before this year’s Hit The North and painted these entwined hands in east Belfast. She also painted a piece in Kent Street for HTN24.

East Bread Street, Connswater, east Belfast.