“… but so is hope.” World Mental Health Day was October 10th, and in support of the cause and their “elephant in the room” report (with Belfast Youth Forum and Children’s Law Centre), the Northern Ireland Youth Forum (Fb | tw), with the support of Peace IV funding, produced this mural on Northumberland Street, just above the security gates.
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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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The IRSP last month (September, 2018) launched a campaign on Facebook, youtube, and twitter to poll various districts on the question of a border poll. “Unity referendum now! British occupation has been a disaster for the people of Ireland. A united Ireland is the way forward for all the people of Ireland.” The one above is on the fence around the North Queen Street play park; the one below (“88% of Divis people”) is below Divis tower.
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John Leathem, chairman of the Divis Tower Falls Residents’ Association, died in his flat on the 19th floor of Divis Tower in August last year (2017), after returning to the Tower four years previously when he was diagnosed with cancer (Irish News | Tele). He was described by Sınn Féın MLA Fra McCann as “a champion for the people of no property” (An Phoblacht). This new mural is outside his former office on the first floor.
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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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The main panel (shown below) is a tribute to soldiers in the Great War (1914-1918), with a border of poppies and silhouetted soldiers reflecting over helmets on crosses. To the side, however, is the modern UVF volunteer (shown above), with balaclava and assault rifle.
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In ancient Greek mythology, the Athenian Theseus (though here carrying a Spartan shield) killed the Cretan king Minos’s bull (minotaur) to end the sacrifice of Athenian youths as retribution for the earlier death of his son Androgeos at the Panathenaic games. Glasgow artist Rogue One (Fb | ig) recreated the myth for CNBX/HTN18.
Previously: Rogue One in London-/Derry.
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This hooded gunman from the East Belfast UVF – like the series of stencils featured previously in EB UVF – is on a wall in Newtownards’s Westwinds estate. Below is a EB UVF mural at the bottom of Bowtown, not far from the West Belfast UDA mural in Greenwell St. The UVF and UDA also compete in the Glen estate; compare Today’s Local with Our Heritage In Your Hands.
Questions about EB UVF lawlessness in north Down arose over the summer with a “business opportunity” presented to local hostelries (Belfast Live | ITV).
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13 year-old Brian Stewart died on October 10th, 1976 – 42 years ago today – six days after being hit by a plastic bullet fired by the King’s Own Scottish Borders near his Turf Lodge Home. He was buried three days later, on October 13th – what would have been his fourteenth birthday. (For the long search for justice, see sister Marie Stewart | sceptic peg | saoirse32).
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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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English artist Rob Heard (web | tw) created 3,775 jointed wooden sculptures, wrapped in calico, one for each soldier from the 36th (Ulster) and 10th (Irish) and 16th (Irish) regiments, or from Belfast, whose body was not recovered from the Somme battlefields. They were laid out last month in the Garden Of Remembrance at Belfast City hall (see second image). On Armistice Day this November, the Belfast figures will be included in a larger display commemorating 72,396 Commonwealth soldiers in London (more info).
See previously: An installation of “crush art” to commemorate the Jewish ghetto in WWII – So They Go To Meet The Death.
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“In memory of our fallen INLA volunteers, upper Springfield area: Hugh Ferguson, Ronnie Bunting, Noel Little, Hugh O’Neill, Micky Kearney, John McColgan, Paddy “Paddybo” Campbell. Comrades: Barry “Baz” McMullan, Sean “Shanto” fleming, Harry O’Hara, Paul Collins, Bernado Brownlee, Emmanuel Kelly, Michael Conlon, Billy Lynch, James “Harpo” Murray, John Kennaway. Saoırse go deo [freedom forever].” Ferguson was the first member of the INLA to die, in 1975 in the feud with the OIRA. Bunting and Little/Lyttle (both Protestants) were shot dead in 1980 in Bunting’s Andersonstown home by masked gunmen from the UDA or SAS with RUC complicity.
Whiterock Road, Belfast, next to the Kevin Lynch – Marian Price – Kevin Lynch wall.
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Extramural Activity 