These two images are from outside the IRSP offices on the Falls Road at Donegall Road. The idea of painting electrical and other utility boxes (Visual History) started with street art on boxes in the city centre and has now spread into CNR areas. This one (above) appears to have been left incomplete, at least compared to the one around the corner in St James’s Park – see the Paddy Duffy Collection.
A student makes their way through the cycles of the moon, with Pride pin, skull earring, and owl familiar (and horcrux scar on the cheek?) to guide the way.
Street art by emic (web) at Belfast Royal Academy on the Cliftonville Road, north Belfast.
Children play among and with the landmarks of the world – riding the Sydney opera house, building the pyramids out of sand, climbing the Eiffel Tower, building the Taj Mahal from blocks, blowing on a windmill, and swinging from Samson and Goliath.
This is an old (2016) piece by Friz (web), still in excellent shape on the wall of Currie Primary school, off the Limestone Road in north Belfast.
As an apéritif for Hit The North 2025 many local artists painted on the “Belfast Stories” hoarding along North Street in mid-April. Here is a selection, from Wee Nuls (web), All The Doodz (ig), KVLR (web), Kilian (ig), and Graffic Belfast (ig). For all fifteen pieces, see the Paddy Duffy Collection.
For the previous art on these hoardings, see ‘Bout Ye?
Here is a small selection of pieces from this year’s Hit The North (2025). (For complete coverage, see the map of Hit The North festivals.)
Politics of any sort rarely intrudes (see the 2019 Lyra McKee piece, which is still present in Kent St) but there were two pieces about the current devastation of Gaza were included, one by JMK with the caption “I Stand With Kneecap” and another by Conor McClure with the title “Know Their Names”.
Above and immediately below: “Make Art For Money” and “Picashso” by Luck (ig). Descriptions of the pieces in each photo are interposed below.
An eye containing a reflection of the Sunflower bar by My Dog Sighs (web), and a seated painter by Sanchai (ig).
“Stand By Your Trans” by Mel Carroll (web), “Wonder Day” by Jacky Sheridan (web), and a smiling face by SillyMe (ig) , in front of BUST’s “Dry Gin” from 2022 and a fox by Annatomix from 2023.
Derry native Nell McCafferty was commemorated by a new mural in the Maiden City, launched on International Women’s Day (March 8th), 2025, and the annual Femme Sesh event was also dedicated to McCafferty (ig | Derry Journal).
McCafferty died last year (2024) after a long career as a journalist and activist (BBC). “Goodnight, sisters” was her parting phrase at the end of her segments on The Women’s Programme, which aired on RTÉ between 1983 and 1986 (Journal).
Here is RTÉ footage of Nell and Marian Finucane on the Late Late in 1991 and in 1980.
The mural was painted by Peaball (web) on a gable in Lisfannon Park and is visible from Lecky Road. The portrait of McCafferty appeared on the cover of (the Penguin Ireland edition of) her autobiography Nell.
These three cars are by DanK (ig) in Bank Square, Belfast city centre, on the wall of Crown Jesus Ministries (Fb) (in the Berry Street Presbyterian building), replacing the ‘Creation’ mural painted in 2012. Dan calls the piece “Hope” (ig) after the church’s ‘Hope Mission Centre’ (ig); this is the same title he gave to the geisha on the Shankill. This piece does not feature any of the kanji street-signage that would place it in Japan (compare with Night Taxi in the Woodvale), though there is some on the pink car, left.
“Deadly” here means “excellent” or “terrific”, perhaps from the idea of “hitting the (living!) target” (Stack) – it is a piece of southern slang that artist and print-maker Leo Boyd (web) perhaps picked up on his journey from Bristol to Dublin to Belfast (Boyd | Atom) where he is one of the Vault Studios artists (Vault).
The new work shown here is at the American Bar (web) in Sailortown.
A kraken awakes in Belfast harbour, under the watchful eyes of working-class men on the waterfront in Belfast’s Sailortown, in front of local landmarks.
Saoırse don Phalaıstín [Freedom for Palestine]. On August 9th, 2024, Irish-language rappers Kneecap launched a third mural in Hawthorn Street/Sráıd Na Sceıthe, (joining Incendiary Device and England Get Out Of Ireland,) which blows up a sticker seen on a nearby street-sign (seen previously in Land Grab) into a mural and which imitates the version from England Get Out Of Ireland which shows Britain grabbing a piece of Ireland.
Extramural Activity 