Here are two shots of the mash-up which has appeared in various city-centre locations, of Ian Paisley Jr’s visage superimposed on the bust of Kim Jong-Un. The first (above) is at the junction of Corporation St and Dunbar Link; the second (below) is in Hill Street, and is pasted over the torn remains of the previous generation of Paisley paste-up: Ian senior with a face filled in with the harp-side of pre-Euro Irish coins (see TLO’s “Doctored Paisley” web-site). For other versions of last year’s Paisley posters, see: Three Studies Of Ian Paisley | Demonizing Paisley
Jamie Dornan (from Holywood) and Gillian Anderson are stars of the BBC series The Fall. He plays a serial-killer terrorizing Belfast and she the detective leading the investigation. Anderson is not shown here as she appears in The Fall, but in the style of Fifty Shades OfGrey, the BDSM-explicit novel by E. L. James, which has now been made into a movie, starring Dornan. It goes on general release tomorrow, Valentine’s Day, February 14th.
The panel above is one of a dozen from the new “upstairs” part of the Belfast Windows piece by Ciaran Gallagher (web) in the courtyard of the Dark Horse/Duke Of York. As Ciaran himself warns on his Facebook page, the “upstairs” material is adult and “not for the faint-hearted”. Below you can see the middle quartet: in the attic, a semi-nude woman behind bars with a menacing face in the background; on the left, Romper Room is on the TV and the skinhead sports a Mr. Do-Bee tattoo, but this is a UDA romper room, not kid’s playtime: two hoods take baseball bats to a victim; and in the middle, a pot-smoking policeman (in RUC/early-PSNI uniform) stands under the grow-lights of a cannabis factory.
“Attempted criminalisation of republican prisoners is alive and well”: Above is a new board erected 2015-01-23 by Republican Network For Unity (RNU)’s Cogús committee in support of “Republican prisoner welfare and support”: “End controlled movement, forced strip searches now.” On the opposite corner, the Rock Bar advertises the Celtic v Rangers League Cup match last Sunday February 1st.
Maghaberry Prison’s Roe House, home to about 50 republican prisoners, was this past week the scene of a stand-off with prison guards, as 30 (BelTel) or 40 (BBC) inmates refused to enter their cells. There was also a protest outside the jail and a bomb-threat on Tuesday (U.tv).
Vacant houses are targets for thieves stealing copper tanks, pipes, and wiring, which they sell to unscrupulous scrap-metal dealers. In one case, the theft caused a gas leak which resulted in houses being evacuated (BelTel). The Housing Executive now removes the copper from empty residences and replaces it when the resident moves in, at a cost of about £3,000 (BBC-NI).
“Warning: Copper tanks and pipes have been removed from this property. Keep out. This property is being monitored for unlawful activity.”
Arts For All (Fb | Web) is a community arts organization in north Belfast, sponsoring workshops and events, giving space to artists-in-residence, and putting on exhibits in its John Luke Gallery. The image above is of the mural on the side of their own building on the York Road, painted in 2012 by JMK (Jonny McKerr) and DMC (Dermot McConaghy) – their signatures can be seen on the brickwork at the right. Arts For All were also one of the sponsors of the recent WWI mural by Jonny in Tigers Bay: The Undertaker | The Home Front.
The final spot on Northumberland Street (see previously: Reserved) was taken in September by this mural for Youth In Motion’s ‘Bytes’ project, which seeks to build basic skills and assist job-seekers (Fb | Web (YIM) | Web (Bytes)).
Milltown Cemetery contains what appear to be three large, unused, spaces (see the second and third images, below). They are in fact the Poor Grounds, mass graves of those unable to afford an individual grave. The plaque shown above puts their number at 65,000; WP puts it at 80,000. (The total number buried is about 200,000.) They include victims of typhus in the 1870s, and of the great influenza pandemic of 1918-1919. There is more information at CultureNI and Milltown Cemetery.Tom Hartley’s book on Milltown was released by Blackstaff Press last year (2014).
“Public Sections 24, 27 & 33, opened November 1869, closed January 1937, hold the remains of 65,000 men, women and children. Rannóga pobıl 24, 27 & 33 fosclaíodh é Samhaın 1869, druıdeadh é Eanáır 1937. Istıgh tá 65,000 corp d’fhır, mhná agus de pháıstí. Requiescant in pace.”
A selection of shovels and brooms stand to attention in the courtyard of The Hideout bar, in Donegall Pass, beneath boards to the 14th battalion of the Royal Irish Rifles and soldiers in WWI.
Old graffiti doesn’t go away. It persists, witness to the aspirations and angers of years past.
Above, “Disband the RUC” in Bóthar Chaıtríona/St. Katharine’s, republican west Belfast. Below, “If the leaders are impotent… only the people can rise” – anarchist graffiti in Melrose Street and “B-Men not cowards” in Agnes St, Loyalist west Belfast. These are all late-2014 pictures of graffiti that are at least three years old.
Extramural Activity 