St. Patrick’s on Donegall Street serves as the local Catholic church for the New Lodge. Its spire rises above the houses in a detail from the community mural at the bottom of the New Lodge, painted by Ed Reynolds (steadyhanded.com), based on vintage photographs of the area and its residents.
“Peace is more difficult than war. We were not scared as we resisted; we will not be scared when we make peace.” Turkish-born Kurdistan Workers’ Party founder Abdullah Öcalan has been in prison since 1999, during which time he has changed from advocating violence to advocating a political solution to the Kurdish situation in Turkey. (WP) The conflict has resulted in a minimum of 45,000 deaths. (WP)
The mural was launched on Sunday (2014-07-06); it replaces the Sands Family mural. Below is a shot from January 2017 showing damage to the mural.
Above is another panel from the new Lodge multi-panel community mural done by Ed Reynolds on North Queen Street, based on vintage photographs of locals. In the lower right-hand corner are the words “Tilly & Margaret Moreland”.
INLA volunteers Paul McCann, Matt McLarnon, Danny Loughran, and Gino Gallagher are commemorated in a new board unveiled today (2014-06-29) on Northumberland Street. The work shows the four in uniform against a backdrop of Divis flats, St. Peters, and the plough in the stars. Information about the deaths of each of the four can be found via this IRSP page. The IRSP/Teach na Fáilte sponsored the piece, which is by Fra Maher and covers over the centre part of the yellow IRSP mural. Maher also did the anti-fascist/Spanish civil war mural at the left edge of the image above.
Her Majesty’s Prison Belfast, better known as The Crumlin Road Gaol, was visited by the Queen on Tuesday (2014-06-24), probably not at the beckoning of this advertisement on the corner of Divis and Northumberland streets, next to the mural of Kieran Nugent and Brendan Hughes. One of the former residents of the jail, Martin McGuiness, showed the Queen around (which not everyone was happy with – The Guardian).
The jail opened in 1846 (under Queen Victoria, during the Hunger), closed in 1996, was transferred to OFM/dFM in 2003, and opened to the public in 2007 (DSI). Other notable prisoners include seven militant suffragettes (among them Dorothy Evans and Madge Muir, arrested for possession of explosives BBC – includes 6 min. audio | Belfast Suffragettes | WRDA), Eamon De Valera, Bobby Sands, Ian Paisley, and Michael Stone (WP), as well as Tom Mitchell and Phil Clarke, elected to Westminster in 1955 for Sinn Féin while still in prison (An Phoblacht).
Audio tour of the prison from CultureNI | Video footage of the Queen’s visit from The Telegraph.
The (unattributed) photo on which the Kieran Nugent mural is based in included below. See also this BBC video.
Ed Reynolds has completed a set of more than 20 panels at the switchback steps and ramps that lift pedestrians from North Queen Street into the New Lodge estate. As described on his web site, many of the panels are based on old photographs of the area and its residents. The work was officially unveiled on Wednesday (June 18th) and was sponsored by New Lodge Arts and Belfast City Council.
The Medjugorje [here, Medugorje] mural on Berwick Road in Ard Eoın/Ardoyne has been touched up. The mural shows an apparition of “Our Lady Of Medjugorje, The Queen Of Peace” and St. James Church in the countryside “between the mountains” in (what is now) Herzegovina. The town became famous after two apparitions in 1981 and since then has been a destination for pilgrims (WP).
Cliftonville FC are 2013-2014 NI Premiership and League Cup champions thanks in part to player of the year Joe Gormley who scored 37 goals during the season – a club record. He is shown here breaking an LP record.