Street and ceramic artist Malarko (ig | profile) replaced his own previous art on this wall on the side of the Sunflower bar (from 2013) – see No Topless Bathing.
July 25th:
July 24th:
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X15184 courtesy of Seosamh Mac Coille
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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In the early hours of Tuesday morning, the Townsend Street offices of homeless charity the Welcome Organisation (web) were rammed with a car which was then set alight (BBC). The graffiti shown above has now appeared on the other side of the Falls Road, threatening anyone who works on the restoration of the building. “Any work-men repairing Welcome centre will be shot!”
The IRSP issued a statement in which they expressed support for the work of the charity but asserted that local residents have been asking for the relocation of the charity for a decade due to the anti-social behaviour of some of Welcome’s clients (see Xitter one | two | the BBC article below | Belfast Media | BelTel). After the attack, the Organisation made an initial statement explaining its altered services and hope for a drop-off point for donations in the light of the attack (Belfast Live) but yesterday said that it would consider moving if it could not reach an agreement with locals at a meeting next week (BBC).
Milford Close, Divis, west Belfast
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God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son (John 3:16). And greater love hath no man but to lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13, often used in the context of military sacrifice). But local homes are for local people. (The use of a stencil is a step up in sophistication.)
The Union Flag fills the empty frame where there used to be a list of locals who died in The Belfast Blitz.
Hogarth Street, Tiger’s Bay, north Belfast.
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Jayden Braniff passed away in August in 2023 (Fb) from neuroblastoma. He was made an honorary member of the Pride Of Ballymacash (Lisburn) flute band (Fb). He is remembered by the Pride Of Ardoyne (Fb) and the Shankill Protestant Boys (Fb) in a tarp in Lawnbrook Avenue (upper Shankill, Belfast), next to the Walter Smith/Rangers tarp (one | two) and near his father’s house (Funeral Times).
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Verz’s (ig) Hindu man on the side of the Hospice Shop in Finaghy was paint-bombed back in December (2023) even before it had been completed (see Tilaka) and after subsequent vandalism was “removed following community engagement”. At a subsequent meeting, Nisha Tandon (CAP profile) of ArtsEkta (web) (whose grant is paying for this and other south Belfast murals) was subject to racist remarks (Belfast City Council’s South Belfast Area Working Group – pdf). At a June 5th meeting (Fb), however, this design by emic (web) – of a bunch flowers being offered from one person to another – was accepted.
The in-progress shot (final image) is from August 7th
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“‘For us there is no valid definition of socialism other than the abolition of the exploitation of one human being by another’ – Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara, Marxist revolutionary, 1928-1967.” The line comes from Che’s address at the Afro-Asian Economic conference in Algeria in 1965.
These Lasaır Dhearg (web) stencils and stickers also propose that it is “time for a socialist republic” (drawing inspiration from James Connolly) and that “the PSNI is not a normal police force” (for background see Just Don’t in the Seosamh Mac Coılle collection).
Stewartstown Road, west Belfast. For the same stencil of Connolly, though providing a better representation of the man, see Time For A Socialist Republic.
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The gates in the “peace” line at Kells Avenue, Stewartstown, are unlocked each morning at seven, allowing people to walk between to walk between Lenadoon and Blacks Road (the Lidl is on the Lenadoon side) until they are locked each evening at seven. The gates were painted by emic (ig) in December 2022, with PEACE IV funding (Belfast City Council).
The Stewartstown/Lenadoon side:
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Kieran Doherty died in the 1981 hunger strike after 73 days of fasting; the Andersonstown mural in his memory shows scenes from his funeral cortège on August 4th.
In preparation for this year’s anniversary, the mural has been refreshed and a new, enlarged image of Doherty’s parents, Alfie and Margaret, included. The photograph that provides a source can be seen in the An Phoblacht report on the funeral of Alfie, who died in 2008. Margaret Doherty died in 2019 (Bobby Sands Trust).
See Kieran Doherty for images of the mural when originally launched in 2014. For the memorial stone depicted in the fourth image, see Those Who Endure The Most.
A close-up of the plaque to Roger Casement can be seen in Seas Leıs An Phalaıstín.
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“Our wee champ.” 21-year-old boxer Liam McGuinness, of Gleann ABC (Fb), died by suicide in October 2010, one of the many people to take their own lives in west Belfast that year among the 313 in all of Northern Ireland (Irish Examiner | Guardian | NI Assembly). A vigil was held in September (in Twinbrook) to commemorate the suicides there (BBC); another was held in the days after McGuinness’s death (BBC); a forum on the topic was held by Sınn Féın. The mural in his memory and in support of suicide awareness is outside the club, off the Glen Road in Hannahstown.
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Paddy Duffy Collection 