Above, a recruitment tarp for the Blues And Royals flute band (Fb).
Below, (and on the wall above the flute band’s tarp) a NI Centenary board using the St Patrick’s saltire in the background. The saltire is an Anglo symbol of Ireland and was included in the Union Flag when the union was between Britain and Ireland and thus – like the word “Ulster” – has been reduced to signifying Northern Ireland after partition.
Above and immediately below are two new paste-ups by Leo Boyd which attempt – by example and by reverse-psychology – to turn the hoarding around the War Memorial building in Waring Street into a paste-up gallery (similar to the new “legal wall” for graffiti and street-art in Little Patrick Street – see First!).
The third image is of a Boyd paste-up already on the wall, mixing the police land-rover (see Off The Edge for an index) with the cat looming over city hall (see Belfast Kitty Hall). The final stencil is by French artist MDLF (ig).
ADW’s (web) popular piece Deep Love, originally painted for HTN 2017, was repainted back in May, after he painted a piece in Union Street for HTN 2025.
Féıle An Phobaıl (web) is now headquartered in the renovated (BCC) St Comgall’s on Divis Street in Ionad Eileen Howell, and during this year’s (2025) festival is home to an exhibition called “Vibrant Colours, Violent Past”, the centrepiece of which is a 20-foot-long panoramic history of republicanism, with Wolfe Tone, James Connolly, and Martin McGuinness as pivotal figures.
A leaflet distributed at the launch (on August 1st) explained the genesis of the project, as follows:
“A few years ago I met a great friend of Ireland and art collector Darius Anderson from California who was here on a trip with his wife Wendy and hoping to see some new work by Irish artists, not only work destined for gallery walls but having been fortunate to be included on one of local guide Dee Morgan’s tours he developed a love for and focus on our world-recognised mural art tradition.
“Then last year on another trip here I was able to introduce Darius to my life-long friends and probably the most prolific contributors to our local landscape.
“From a casual meeting alongside Marty and Micky at work repainting the Vol. Kieran Doherty mural in Andersonstown came an inspired suggestion that we accept a challenge from him to tell our story graphically on a canvas rather than the usual brick wall, not just on canvas to hang on a wall in his gallery in L.A. but a canvas to cover the entire wall 20ft x 7ft!
“Excited by our positive response Darius wondered could we invite some loyalist artist/activist to contribute a similar large canvas celebrating the history of the British, Unionist, Loyalist community here.
“That was last July. This exhibition is a result of that meeting but also a chance for the public to remind themselves of our often colourful and unfortunately violent past. – Danny D, Muralist/Activist”
“History is like a rearview mirror! You must always check back but you must keep focused on the road ahead, otherwise you are going to crash!” (Similar wording was used in a piece – Painting From The Same Palette – painted by Danny D and Mark Ervine in 2008.)
The exhibition was launched on August 1st and also included four display boards featuring murals by Danny D (CNR) and Dee Craig (PUL) (Fb).
Jim McCabe, “life-long campaigner for truth and justice” after his wife Norah was killed by a plastic bullet in 1981, returns to the “International Wall” (Visual History) on Divis Street. The original mural – from a few months after his death in January 2023 – was replaced by A Window To A Free Country, one of the Palestinian-inspired murals. This new version replaces The Land Is Ours.
“In memory of all the innocent victims murdered and seriously injured by British Crown forces.”
The image above is from August 2nd; the images below are from July.
Here is a gallery of small boards on flower boxes in “the Village Green community park of remembrance”: “The Protestant faith we will maintain. Your culture needs you. Join your local band, Orange lodge, Apprentice Boys, Royal Black historical group”, with Kitchener pointing at the viewer; “Deserted – Well, I can stand alone!“; “Ulster Day, 28th September, 1912“; “No Home Rule. Let our flag run out straight in the wind. The old red shall be floated again. When the ranks that are thinned shall be thinned. When the names that are twenty are ten“; – Edward Carson and the formation of the Ulster Volunteers in 1913; – All nine counties of Ulster are “Hands up!” “against Home Rule”.
This is work by Ona Salvador (ig) on the shutters of Skull And Bones Tattoo Society (web) in North Street, replacing the sign for the tattoo convention (see Inkology). Salvador also did a piece in Union Street for HTN25.
Roden Street was divided in two when the Westlink was built along the path of the Blackstaff to join the M1 at Broadway with the Grosvenor Road. (This portion of the Westlink opened in 1981; a Klaus Fröhlich photograph of a blocked-off Roden Street on the CNR side, looking towards Divis, is included at the end of the post.) The vintage mural in the top left of the first board (above) was in Clifford Street and is now on the Grosvenor Road (CNR) side of the motorway. (The mural can be seen in Visual History 01.)
“Defend the right to protest”, specifically to protest the treatment of Palestinians in Gazan.
The UK government introduced legislation in 2023 to prevent and tackle protests that might cause “more than minor disruption” to the community (Reuters), in contravention, according to Amnesty International, of Article 11 of the Human Rights Act. The High Court ruled against the government in 2024 and its appeal was rejected by the Appeals Court in May, 2025 (Reuters). The latest (late July 2025) Crime And Policing policy paper can be found at gov.uk.
Specifically related to protests about Gaza, in June the group Palestine Action was declared a terrorist organisation by UK government, because of the group’s “criminal damage in support of a cause” – specifically, its attacks on the facilities of the RAF and various weapons’ manufacturers; the group’s initial appeal was heard in the High Court last week (BBC) and the judge yesterday (July 30th) ruled that the group could challenge the designation (Independent).
Shown above is a hand-painted cloth sign on the railings of the Waterworks in north Belfast.
Paddy Duffy Collection 