The Forbidden Emoji

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In Raimondi’s Adam And Eve, an engraving from c. 1512, Adam offers Eve two small apples while a human-headed serpent looks on (Met). (The town in the background is from Raimondi, but the car in the middle is Boyd’s.)

In Leo Boyd’s reworking, all the heads have been turned into surveillance cameras – including the snake in the tree, the private parts have been covered by “Fig. 1” and “Fig. 2”, and the forbidden fruit is now a heart emoji, which in this instance has literally been cut out of the print. Our surveillance culture (inlcuding “social” media) perhaps makes emotional connection more difficult and more dangerous than ever – we are ashamed to appear naked.

The paste-up is on the hoarding in Donegall Quay, below a ring of surveillance cameras. Belfast is the 100th-most surveilled city in the world, per capita (CEOWorld).

For information about the production of the piece, and images that include the heart that has been torn out, see Leo Boyd Prints.

Previous posts featuring Boyd’s work.

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We Must Choose Our Fate

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Three stickers of resistance in Belfast’s city centre: above, communistparty.ie confirms Marx’s prediction of capitalism’s inevitable failure; below, under-paid, over-worked, and mis-treated hospitality workers are encouraged to “give the goss on your boss”; next below, an old sticker calling for Northern Ireland to follow the Republic in adopting abortion leglislation (parliament.uk) – “not the church, not the state, we must choose our fate – #thenorthisnow [Image.ie]” (as well as a commercial sticker by the singer A.N.J.A.); finally below, from Sailortown, stickers from the IWW or wobblies (“one big union.ie“) and the United Tech & Allied Workers (“the past we inherit, the future we build”).

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Tríocha Blıaın Ag Fás

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What is now Coláıste Feırste began life as Meánscoıl Feırste in 1991, teaching a group of nine students a curriculum inspired by Patrick Pearse (discussed previously in An Tusa An Chéad Laoch Eıle?) and based in Cultúrlann MacAdam-Ó Fıaıch (Cultúrlann). It moved to Beechmount in 1998 and in 2018 expanded into new buildings that were meant to accommodate 600 pupils (Doherty Architects), which it has now exceeded (BBC) as it enters its thirty-third year in existence.

The theme of preserving and promoting the Irish language occurs in several places in the mural: next to Pearse we see his saying, “Máırtín Ó Chadháın ” [a land without a language [is] a land without a soul], in the classroom scene we have “Labhaır í agus maırfıdh sí” [speak it and it will endure], and finally we see the Dream Dearg protesting for an Irish-Language Act (see previously #AchtAnoıs).

The in-progress images included below among completed detailed shots date from May 6th and 20th.

Giant’s Foot/Beechview Park. Replaces the short-lived mural of Olympians, seen in Sporting Giants.

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And The Cry Of The City Went Up To Heaven

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London social-worker Paddy McCarthy took a job at the Ballymurphy Tenants’ Association in west Belfast in 1970. On August 11th, 1971, he tried to broker a ceasefire and evacuation of children from Ballymurphy, where a curfew had been imposed after the introduction of internment. He carried a Red Cross flag but was shot in the hand. He regrouped and then tried to distribute milk to families, but was stopped by two soldiers who either fired over his head or put an unloaded gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger. He died of a heart attack. (Belfast Media | WP | Ballymurphy Massacre | Ballymurphy And The Irish War, written by one of McCarthy’s successors, Ciarán De Baróid, who came to work for the BTA in 1972 – Belfast Media)

The memorial plaque is in Ballymurphy Road, as is the graffiti below: “OIRA [-] Beware hoods.”

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This Country Is Worth Fighting For

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“In commemoration of King William III and his victory at the Battle Of The Boyne, 1st July 1690.” King William and images of Carrickfergus and the Boyne are included on the left of the board: in Ireland, William in person travelled from Carrickfergus to Drogheda and – after the victory at the Boyne – to Dublin, from which he left to pursue the war in Europe; his troops, on the other hand, after landing in Groomsport (1689) and Carrickfergus (1690) and fighting at the Boyne, continued on southward, to Cork and then to Limerick, and westward, to Athlone, Aughrim, and (again) Limerick. The campaign ended in October, 1691, with the signing of the Treaty Of Limerick. The information is available in pdf format from the Schomberg House Museum.

King William’s Corner joins Queen’s Corner and King’s Corner (and first of them all, Conor’s Corner –Conor’s ‘The Twelfth In Wellington Place, Belfast 1918’ is included to the left of the map, under a few lines from The Sash – “It is old but it is beautiful, and its colours they are fine/It was worn at Derry, Aughrim, Enniskillen and the Boyne” – and “The Boyne Standard [a.k.a. the flag of the Orange Order] with the heraldic crest of King William”).

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Copyright © 2023 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X12764 [X12763] X12762 [X12761] X12765 “This artwork was commissioned by ACT Initiative [web] – Protecting Our Community.”

Living In Poverty

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“Population of the Six Counties: 1,800,000. Living in poverty: 313,000. Children in poverty: 100,000.”

The source for the statistics presented might be the Department Of Communites, which gives statistics for 2021-2022; the Rowntree foundation has a report on 2022 poverty levels. No source is given here or on the campaign’s web page at Lasaır Dhearg (web | tw).

Glenveagh Drive; with a bonus image of on old Marian Price stencil in nearby Carrigart Avenue.

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Bloom With Grace

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“Wherever life plants you, bloom with grace.” When the Shankill Women’s Centre was first formed, in 1987, it was located in The Hummingbird on the lower Shankill (SWC). (When the Wellbeing Centre was built on that site, the Women’s Centre moved further up the Shankill to its current location in the Hammer.) A hummingbird features in one of the paintings on the hoarding around the construction site of a new “Shankill Shared Women’s Centre” on Lanark Way, a 6.5 million euro project funded by PEACE IV (Belfast CC).

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Shankill Parade

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The Shankill Area Social History (SASH) (Fb) celebrates the people and events of the Shankill Road with a new mural in Downing Street.

From left to right: girls wrapped in Union Flags watching the parade; boys on pallets; the Shankill Mission; Orange Order parade; the Summer festival in Woodvale Park (The Cabin); the former Belfast Savings Bank, now an undertaker’s; the Winter festival and switching-on of the Christmas tree lights, with Mrs. Claus, the Grinch in Santa jacket and hat, and last year’s (2022) celebrity guest Charlie Lawson (youtube); local band Casual Riots (ig). (SASH Fb Gallery)

For a mural of famous Shankill faces and places, see Save The Shankill.

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Solidarity With The French Riots

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“Solidarity with the French riots against racism & police – justice for Nahel!” 17 year-old Nahel Merzouk was shot and killed on June 27th by a motor-cycle policeman in Nanterre, France. The scope of use of firearms by police was expanded in 2017 to include dangerous drivers who refused to stop; Merzouk was at the wheel of a Mercedes that had twice failed to stop and (according to police) was putting others in danger. Police specifically alleged that the car, after the second stop, was driving towards the officer; video evidence later disproved this. This cover-up, combined with long-running discontent over the use of deadly force by police, led to six nights of rioting in which two people were killed, more than 3,000 people arrested, and 800 police injured. (BBC includes video | Independent | WP)

Divis Street, Belfast

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Model Learner

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This is a new mural on the Ballysillan Road by MWAK/Pigment Space (ig) close to the Boys’ Model and featuring a student at the centre of symbols of learning – a film camera in the top left; Hokusai’s Great Wave in the top right, for art; Titanic (for engineering?) and a thermometer (for chemistry? or global warming?) on the right; musical notes in the bottom right; sports in the bottom left. The dates on the left are obscure. “1971” is perahps for the year the school won the Schools’ Cup in rugby (News Letter); there is a soccer ball next to “1996” but no similar victory can be found – get in touch if you can supply a meaning.

Replaces the Alternatives mural seen in Our Wee Country and No Alternative.

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