Paddy Duffy Collection

Get Up, Derry

2024-08-042024-12-21Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Here is a gallery of images from the ‘Get Up’ paint jam, organised by Peaball (web) in Derry at the end of June as part of the Foyle Maritime Festival (ig).

In order (from top to bottom), there are three in Strand Road, from emic (web), KONE (ig), and ACHES (ig), five in Lower Clarendon Street, by RAZER (ig), Chose Letters (ig), Will Vibes (ig), Friz (web), DanLeo (web), and finally, three by Zippy (web) at The Lounge café in Clarendon Street.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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The Menin Gate

2024-08-042025-06-22Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The Menin Gate memorial, at the eastern edge of Ypres, Belgium, commemorates 54,896 Commonwealth soldiers who died in the area during WWI and whose bodies were not recovered. “To the armies of the British Empire who stood here from 1914 to 1918 and to those of their dead who have no known grave.”

The buglers below have remained unfinished since (at least) 2018.

Ebrington Street, off Bond’s Street, Londonderry, leading to the Ebrington Centre car park.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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Welcome To The Brandywell

2024-08-042024-11-07Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“Fáilte go dtí Brandywell [Tobar An Bhranda]” This mural featuring the rights of children was painted in Derry’s Brandywell area in 2014; it puts images alongside parts of Caroline Castle’s rendering of the UN’s Rights of the Child. One, for example, reads “Understand that all children are precious. Pick us up if we fall down and if we are lost lend us your hand. Give us things we need to make us happy and strong and always do your best for us whenever we are in your care. Right no. 3”.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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Comrades In Arms

2024-08-042024-10-30Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

John Meeke signed the Ulster Covenant in Dervock Orange Hall in 1912 and went to war with the Ulster Volunteers. Willie Redmond, brother of John Redmond, had been jailed three times and was a nationalist MP at Westminster when, at age 53, he signed up for service.

Major Redmond went over the top with the 16th (Irish) Division at Messines Ridge and was hit by machine-gun fire. Private Meeke, a stretcher-bearer with the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in the 36th (Ulster) Division, found and stayed with Redmond under heavy fire, taking two bullets himself.

Redmond would die that night. He was awarded the Legion Of Honour by the French. His East Clare seat was taken by Éamon de Valera. Meeke survived after several surgeries. He was awarded the Military Medal by the British. After the World War, he joined the Specials and LOL 1001 in Benvarden before dying of TB in 1923 (NALIL | Irish Times | WP | BelTel).

This mural (and its very odd accompanying plaque, for a public mural) is in the Ebrington Centre car park, in the Waterside, Londonderry.

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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The Cost Of War

2024-08-042024-10-30Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

From the info plaque (shown last below): “This mural depicts three plinths which stand in the Island Of Ireland Peace Park in the city of Messen [Mesen]/Messines in Belgium. Each plinth represents the number of casualties for each division which was raised on the island of Ireland during the 1st World War. A total of 69,947 soldiers from the island of Ireland were either killed, wounded or reported missing during the four years which the war lasted. The price of freedom.”

The numbers given are: 36th (Ulster) division, 32,186; 16th (Irish) division, 28,398; 10th (Irish) division, 9,363.

The Peace Park is also featured in another mural in the car-park – see The Spirit Of Brotherhood.

Ebrington Centre car park, Waterside, Londonderry

The Changing Leaves

2024-08-042025-02-13Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This leafy – but fading – street art on the upper facade of the Brickwork bar in Magazine Street, Derry, dates back to 2018.

Painted by UVArts (web).

Some May Be From Showing Up, Others Are From Growing Up

2024-08-042025-01-09Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

These roses – in the teeth of skulls and in the hair of lost loves – are by Peaball (web) at the Tattoo Lounge (ig) in Derry.

We Are The Dead

2024-08-042024-10-30Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This mural at the Ebrington Centre in the Waterside, Londonderry, commemorates the WWI dead and wounded from the entire island of Ireland.

The 10th (Irish) Division fought only briefly “in Flanders fields”, towards the very end of the war, having spent most of its time in Gallipoli (in the Ottoman Empire), Macedonia, Egypt, and Palestine. The 16th took part in the Somme, especially at “Guinchy” [Ginchy] and Guillemont, while the 36th were deployed on the first day (the Battle Of Albert).

The poem in the middle is the first half of John McCrae’s In Flanders Fields: “In Flanders fields the poppies blow/Between the crosses, row on row/That mark our place, and in the sky/The larks, still bravely singing, fly/Scarce heard amid the guns below.//We are the dead; short days ago/We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow/Loved and were loved, and now we lie/In Flanders fields.”