painted wall

Linenopolis

Extramural Activity4 Comments

A celebration and exploration of Belfast’s most famous textile, the “linen biennale”, runs until October (web). The Linen Hall library also runs a tour of the “linen quarter” on Thursdays.

Visual Waste’s (ig) Great Victoria Street mural includes various linen quarter buildings: the Grand Opera House, the Europa hotel, and Inst., alongside the H&W cranes and the Titanic museum.

Nomad Clan’s mural in east Belfast also went by the same name.

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The Selkie

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The Seal Folk or Selkies are shape-shifting creatures in island mythologies from Man to Ireland to the Scottish isles to the Faroes to Iceland. Seals in water, they can take off their skins and become (beautiful) humans on land. Without their skins, they cannot return, and so they can be captured by humans who hide their skins. A few tales can be found at Scotland’s Stories.

By KMG (ig) in Dublin Road.

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Lagan Kingfisher

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These are the two sides of the electrical box next to emic’s large wildflowers mural, presumably also by emic (ig). Above is the kingfisher on the Collingwood side and below are the flowers the embankment side. The kingfisher or cruıdín is common throughout Ireland (BirdwatchIreland), including Belfast. Here are two videos of kingfishers on the Lagan: Tom McClean | Tony Dalton.

Here is a Visual History page of electrical boxes in Belfast.

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‘Bout Ye

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How’s about ye?! FGB (ig), Leo Boyd (ig), and KVLR (ig) added three pieces at the end of April to what is now the “Belfast Stories” construction hoarding. FGB’s piece, shown above, was inspired by the fact that the northern branch of North Street was called “Goose Lane” (tw) at the time of (Chichester’s) Belfast Castle, as herders headed through the north gate (see the map at Lennon Wylie). There is a “Goose Lane” plaque on just the other side of Royal Avenue; it is included below.

Dog by Verz (ig)

Fried Eggs by Rob Hilken (ig)

“One of the earliest streets in the city, North Street was known as Goose Lane, along which geese were driven to feed on the fields outside the town. That 17th century street consisted of single-storey houses and the old city wall bisected it at what is now Royal Avenue – Belfast City Council.”

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Horsey Hill

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The Lagan river between Belfast and Lisburn was made navigable in 1763 after seven years of work. The remaining distance between there and Lough Neagh (and the coalfields of east Tyrone, which were connected to Lough Neagh and then Portadown and Newry) required a canal, which finally opened on January 1st, 1794. The were 27 locks on the route between Belfast and the lough, and horses walking on the tow-parth would pull the barges up river (WP | Lagan Valley | Lagan Navigation has photographs of horses at work). Horsey Hill was perhaps the site of stables in south Belfast; it is now the name of the alley that continues on towards the river from the Ukraine sunflower mural off Harrow Street in the Holylands.

Forward South Partnership/Connor McKernan’s video about the history of the Holylands, including Horsey Hill, can be seen on youtube.

Painted by Daniela Balmaverde (ig) and DMC. At the bottom of Horsey Hill, along the embankment, are Animals Two By Two.

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Marrowbone Youth Club

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“Fáılte go dtí Marrowbone youth club [club óıge Mhachaıre Bothaın (Fb)] – better our community by working together.” The verbiage is a mix of Irish and English and the imagery is a mix of youth activities and … a minion.

The previous mural – which included Cliftonville (soccer) and Antrim (GAA) emblems – was seen previously in 2013 and in 2021.

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Repent

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The graffiti on the bottom part of the New Life City Church (web) mural on the west Belfast “peace” line has been painted out and this mild wild-style “repent” added.

New Life murals in the area go back to at least 1997 and one on this stretch of the wall goes back to 2004 – see The Dividing Line Of Hostility.

Update, July 2014: “Show kindness” illustrated with a handshake has been added

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