“Freedom Of Speech” was the name given to a piece that the Bogside Artists did during a stay at Hanover College in November 2010, during a tour of the USA. In that piece, the mouth was closed with plain red tape (Hanover) but for this local version, the mouth is closed with tape that combines the Union Flag with green and orange strands.
As the second image shows, the piece did not last long when put outside – the difference in date between the two images is four days.
The Ballymurphy Massacre took place at the introduction of internment on August 9th, 1971. 11 people were killed by British Army paratroopers over the course of three days. For more background see Ballymurphy Massacre. 2011 is the 30th anniversary and the campaign for truth and justice continues with a ‘march for truth’. The board in the first image was painted by Mo Chara Kelly. The play advertised in the second image is Ballymurphy – The Aftermath, written by Brenda Murphy, directed by Pam Brighton and playing at Conway Mill.
Kevin Lynch, the seventh of the 1981 hunger strikers to die, is buried in Dungiven Cemetery. He is commemorated annually in the town. These images were taken on the day of the 30th anniversary commemoration.
This is a board above the advertising hoarding commemorating the 200th anniversary of the 1798 Rebellion. “Erin go bragh” on the bottom scroll; it’s not clear that anything at all was written in the top scroll.
The accusation of “medical neglect” an appeal for compassionate release due to Lillis’s suffering from the arthritic condition, ankylosing spondylitis. For political background, see Release Brendan Lillis.
A red-headed lass with a horn stands watch for others at a mass rock – a stone in a remote location for Catholic worship, made necessary by a Penal law of 1695 which forbade the religious practice of Catholicism and “dissenter” forms of Protestantism (that is, anything other than Anglicism) (source). The harp, with a “cap of liberty” rather than a crown (WP), together the slogan “Equality – It is new strung and it shall be heard” is the emblem of the Society of United Irishmen (WP). On the other side of the mural linen lies in the fields bleaching and a farmer and wife plough the land with a team of horses and distribute seed.
Relatives for justice (web) youth project holds an annual vigil for victims of plastic bullets and their families. This display places cut-out figures on the railings of the City Cemetery at the distances at which they were hit by a rubber or plastic bullet, between 1972 and 1989. (Previously done in mural form on Divis Street: Ban Plastic Bullets.)
From left to right, the victims are Keith White, Norah McCabe, John Downes, Tobias Molloy, Peter McGuinness, Stephen McConomy, Paul Whitters, Francis Rowntree, Julie Livingstone, Carol Ann Kelly, Seamus Duffy, Brian Stewart, Henry Duffy, Michael Donnelly, Thomas Friel, Peter Doherty.
The board on the far right contains an acrostic for “Plastic Bullets”: “Panic – Lethal – Age – Sorrow – Terror – Innocence – Children. Ban them – Unnecessary – Loss – Life – Extreme use – Transgenerational trauma – Stop using them”.
With support from Pobal, An tAontas Eorpach, and the Community Relations Council.
A permanent ‘show of strength’ on the Newtownards Road, depicting hooded gunmen firing into the air at Dee Street. Purple and orange are the colours of the UVF (and the Orange Order).
Three panels from left to right: “Avenue Road Somme Association – in memory of the fallen 36th Ulster [sic] Division”; “Ulster Volunteer Force – Ulster’s Brave Young Men”; “They whom this scroll commemorates, who at the call of King and Country, left all that was dear to them, endured hardship, faced danger and finally passed out of the sight of men in the path of duty and self sacrifice giving up their own lives that others might live in freedom. Those that came after see to it that their names are not forgotten.”
