Two worlds spring from the mind of the youth in the centre of this new mural by Nozzle & Brush (web | Fb) in south Belfast just off Donegall Pass: on the left, the darkness of drugs, drink, and demons; on the right, the light of sport, music, and spray-painting.
Sınn Féın candidate Pat Sheehan attempted to shore up support among republicans by using the image shown above and below for his campaign propaganda in the recent Assembly elections, hearkening back to the 1981 hunger strike, in which a 23-year-old Sheehan went 55 days without food, until the strike was called off. The tactic was successful and Sheehan was re-elected from his Belfast West constituency.
“Ballymacarrett” comes from Baile Mhıc Gearóıd — MacGarrett’s townland. “Harland” comes from Edward Harland, who bought the shipyard in 1858 and later partnered with Gustav Wolff to form Harland & Wolff.
Two Beechmount murals today on the same theme: republican prisoners of war in Maghaberry and Hydebank (site of prisons for women and for young offenders).
Northern Ireland plays its second match in Euro 2016 today against Ukraine in Lyon, France, hoping to improve on the 1-0 loss to Poland in the first game. Danish beer-maker Carlsberg, whose national team did not make it to the championship, is an official sponsor of the tournament and is advertising in connection with the championship both north and south. The hoarding above is just off Sandy Row in south Belfast, above a UDA/UFF mural “in proud memory of our fallen comrades”.
Érıu/Éıre of the Tuatha Dé Danann, queen of Ireland, (as depicted by Richard J King) is at the centre of various representations of republican women. Along the top are Ann Devlin, Betsy Gray, Mary Ann McCracken, Countess Markievicz, Nora Connolly?, and Winifred Carney. Suffragettes, the modern IRA, and Cumman Na mBan are depicted, as are Máıre Drumm at the Falls Curfew, Tom McElwee’s sisters carrying his coffin, and Molly Childers and Mary Spring Rice running guns on the Asgard. There is also an unusual ‘four provinces’ in the corners.
The wide shot (below) shows the James Connolly mural below (seen previously in 2012) and the (recently added) 1916 centenary board – for which see Ag fíorú na poblachta.
A mural of HMS Belfast “Built in Belfast” being launched on March 17, 1938, next to a fake storefront for “B&M Electricals”, with a Billy Graham hoarding above: “What if you got everything you wanted and it wasn’t enough?”, echoing the mural’s Latin inscription, the motto of Belfast city: What shall we give in return for so much?
Martin McGuinness waits, with hand outstretched, to greet a smiling Queen Elizabeth who strides towards him carrying a bloodied axe and wearing a Union flag apron spattered with the blood of people from Ireland, Palestine, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Mural in Beechmount reproducing a 2012 Latuff cartoon.
Anti-touting posters on the Whiterock and Falls roads: “People Should Not Inform” to the Police Service of Northern Ireland and Mi5. The Falls example also has a “End the internment of Tony Taylor” sticker from “Irish Republican Tims [Fb?]”.