painted wall

Frank McKelvey

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Francis “Frank” McKelvey grew up at 56 Woodvale Road (based on Lennon Wylie and the blue plaque on the wall at this address – Street View). That would put him a stone’s throw from Woodvale Park, which provides the backdrop for this new mural at the end of Woodvale Street. The photograph reproduced, of “Woodvale park pond”, can be seen on the Old Shankill Fb page. The pond was filled in after the second World War (City Council). McKelvey’s ‘A Summer’s Day‘ is perhaps of Woodvale Park pond. He died in 1974 (Ulster History Circle).

By Holly Hooks (ig) in Woodvale Street, west Belfast.

February 14th

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15055 X15052 [X15053] [X15054] [X15056] [X15057] X15082
[X14887] [X14953] [X14954]
X14731 X14733 X14732 [X14734] [X14735] [X14736]

On The Beat

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Beat Carnival Belfast (ig | web) puts on celebrations all over town and teaches skills from its base in Millfield/Brown’s Square. Artists Danni Simpson (ig), Codo (ig), Ana Fish (ig), and FGB (ig) worked together to spray this piece on the Gardiner Street door.

Click to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15044

Garfield’s Street

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

A (Hit The North) Paint Jam was held on Saturday (the 25th) in Lower Garfield Street, organised by Seedhead Arts (ig) and the Belfast Improvement District (BID web). Shown below are Laura Nelson (ig), NRMN (ig), and Ollie Amscai (ig).

For images of all the completed works, see the entry at the Paddy Duffy Collection.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15078 X15079 X15080 X15081

DUP Backs United Ireland

Extramural Activity1 Comment

“DUP backs united Ireland in coming border poll, Mon, 5th May”. This image updates one of the images from two weeks ago of the re-painted mural at Madden’s bar in the city centre – see Sásta A Bheıth Anseo. Initially the newspaper showed a headline relating to the prosecution of DUP (now-former) leader Jeffrey Donaldson on charges of rape and sexual assault.

The DUP in January flirted (strategically) with the idea of supporting a border poll (BBC) but their more typical stance is that the conditions for a poll are not close to being met (News Letter).

While elections sometimes fall on the 5th as the first Thursday in May – most recently the 2022 Assembly elections (CAIN) – the date here is probably a nod to the anniversary of Bobby Sands’s death (in 1981).

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15060

Double Vision

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This piece is on the same office-building as the ‘Be Your Best’ piece featured previously (in Auld Cobblers) at the city-side entrance to east Belfast, at the junction of Middlepath Street and Newtownards Road. Both are by Dee Craig/Belfast Mural Arts (Fb) as part of East Belfast Enterprise’s (web | ig) ‘Connecting Communities Through Art’ initiative. The two works were officially launched together on April 20th (pics on EBE’s Instagram). The two in-progress shots (last below) are from April 16th.

According to this Community NI article, the work has been installed using “a jigsaw-like technique using super strength glue to give it a lifespan of up to 25 years before requiring maintenance”.

Interpretations of the new piece are encouraged; feel free to comment or e-mail.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15029 X15027 [X15028]

Spinning Memories

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The inspiration for this new piece of street art by KMG (ig) was the Strand Spinning Mill (formerly the Jaffe Spinning Mill) which closed in 1983 and is now the Portview Trade Centre. During WWI the mill made munitions and during WWII viscose rayon. The film Lint And Linen (youtube) covers both pre-industrial and mechanical linen-production (though mostly focused on yarn from line fibres rather than from tow, which was the Strand mill’s claim to fame (Duffy Rafferty)); the painting appears to present a more primitive and imaginary age in which fibres could be spun using the human hand.

For photographs of the old mill on the Trade Centre, see previously the image of A Block in Strand Spinning Mill.

“Spinning memories” is the name of a planned collection of stories for an archive at Portview (Portview Stories).

Townsley Street, east Belfast, next to the Narnia sculptures and facing Aslan Is On The Move.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15025 X15026 X15024

Committees Of The Rich

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“Governments in capitalist society are but committees of the rich to manage the affairs of the capitalist class.” So wrote James Connolly in an August 1914 piece in the Irish Worker entitled ‘The War Upon The German nation’ (marxists.org), in which he contended that Britain was using its remaining area of superiority – military might – in order to crush the now-superior German capitalism, science, and labour. (It’s not clear whether, for Connolly’s purposes, Germany’s is a capitalist society.)

“Big” Jim Larkin is also shown, with his arms outstretched, as seen in the photograph included in We Only Want The Earth.

Nik Purdy/Blow Designs (ig), on the Mall, Sligo, next to The Model.

Also in Sligo: Maud Gonne | Westlife

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15000c X15001 X15000

Meditating Boxer

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This is one of Solus’s (ig | web) boxers in graceful poses, painted for HTN24 on Millfield at the bottom of Brown Street.

For close-ups, see the post at Paddy Duffy’s site.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15045 X15046

Childhood Dreams

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This painted box by Karl Fenz (web) is on Middlepath Street past the M3 and within sight of the Teenage Dreams.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15215

Tomorrow

Extramural Activity1 Comment

Sydney-based artist Sophi Odling (web | ig) was in town for HTN24, painting this large piece in York Lane (behind the D block of the new UU building), showing a youngster dreaming of what they will get up to ‘tomorrow’.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2024 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X15094