The work of The Bogside Artists

When Sir Henry Docwra took over the settlement of Derry in 1600 he began a series of plantations in Ulster that effectively ended the autonomy of the Irish Celts. Henceforth, Ireland would be divided, not only geographically with settlers concentrated mainly in the North, but religiously between Protestants and Catholics.
The struggle for Irish independence would continue from that date forth, from one skirmish to the next, from one rebellion to the next, the protagonists ever ready to take advantage of whatever difficulties England might find herself in.

In The Great Famine of 1845-50, over a million people starved to death, a half million were evicted from their homes by landlords, and a million and a half emigrated to America, Britain and Australia. The tragedy not only profoundly affected the politics and development of these countries but served also to strengthen the nationalist aspiration of Ireland to be free to govern itself. Many ex-patriots driven from their homeland to America were only too willing to support "the cause".

The Home Rule Bill of 1921 left the North its own colonial statelet to govern as it saw fit. Ulster became a "Protestant state for a Protestant people" that kept itself in power by the suppression of the Catholic minority. Unionism and loyalty to the crown of England became the bulwark of the new state while Catholic nationalists considered themselves a dispossessed and alienated people. Ireland was demographically and politically divided and has remained so to this day.

In 1968 the Catholics, inspired by the black movement in America, took to the streets in their demands for democratic rights. There followed over thirty years of bloody strife with some 3,600 people killed, most of them civilians, and over 30,000 injured. In a place with a population of well under two million, most people were personally and directly touched by what they call 'The Troubles'.

In a statement on 19 July 1997 the IRA announced another "complete cessation of military operations" This came 15 months after the ending of their previous ceasefire on 9 Feb 96. Though levels of violence have fallen steeply in recent months, sporadic assassinations and so-called "punishment beatings" meted out by paramilitaries, still occur throughout the province. It will take a long time and great resolve politically and culturally to eradicate the many historical barriers that militate against mutual tolerance and the acceptance of differences.

Derry the "maiden city" has a population of roughly 107,000 people, the vast majority of them Catholic. It's worst experience of "The Troubles" came on 30 January 1972 when soldiers from the British Army's 1st Parachute Regiment opened fire on unarmed and peaceful civilian demonstrators in the Bogside, killing 14 people. The march, which was called to protest against imprisonment without trial, was "illegal" according to British government authorities. Later, the infamous Widgery Tribunal set up by the British government found the soldiers were not guilty. Lord Widgery, himself a man of military experience, did little to hide his chauvinistic bias.

In any event, this tragedy, known as "Bloody Sunday", came as a climax to three years of continuous street protests that saw many people injured or imprisoned.

It was in Derry, on August 13th 1969, that the drive for civil rights lost its control in the aftermath of a confrontation between the civil police force and Catholic protesters during the traditional Apprentice Boys march through the city. Rioters were driven back into the Bogside and there followed a pitch battle that lasted two days. On the afternoon of Thursday August 14, the new Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, James Chichester-Clarke, called the British Prime Minister Harold Wilson and asked for troops to be sent to Derry. "The Battle of The Bogside" had ended with the commencement of direct rule from Westminster. This served to ignite the flames of armed struggle on both sides. Tit-for-tat killings became commonplace culminating in the Omagh bombing of 15 August 1998 when twenty-nine people died and more than 220 were injured from a massive car bomb explosion in Omaghs crowded town centre. It was one atrocity among many and for politicians from both sides of the divide it was a crossing of the Rubicon in their quest for peace.

The huge murals of The Bogside Artists stand as dark sentinels to this history of pain and conflict. There are presently 8 murals in all situated along Rossville Street in the heart of The Bogside, the Catholic warren of the city; and the three artists have plans for a further four, the last of which will be a peace mural, a covenant of sorts with the future. Not only have they depicted Bloody Sunday and its victims but the famous "Battle of The Bogside" and "Operation Motorman" that occurred in The Bogside on 31 July 1972 resulting in two civilian deaths. These fatalities, like the fatalities of Bloody Sunday, still pose questions that demand answers from the British government. In Derry's Guildhall an on-going inquiry into the event of Bloody Sunday, set up by British Prime Minister Tony Blair is under way.

Tom Kelly, his brother William and their mutual friend Kevin Hasson have been working on their murals project since late 1993 when the group formed. Older and wiser now, they see their work as commemorative. Theirs is a public art after all, dealing with subject matter that goes far beyond mere aesthetics or the values of the dilettante. Their work is distanced greatly from its Belfast for their is nothing hostile or sectarian about it. It is designed to educate, commemorate and edify. As Tom explains in the words of Bishop Desmond Tutu, " a wound must be cleaned out and examined before it will heal. It is the unexamined wound that festers and finally poisons. Our work shows the wounds." This determination to tell their own story is what drives The Bogside Artists.

"It is not graffiti", as Tom points out. "This is not anger-fuelled immature destruction of private or public property: This is real art done by the people and for the people. That's what makes it authentic. That's what gives it meaning in a world where meaning has all but been destroyed by ambition and the greed for money. It honours our past. Our work commemorates the real price paid by a naive and innocent people for simple democratic rights. If this is not to be commemorated, what is?"

The artists expect to finish their final mural for the Bogside by the summer of 2004. You can find out more about them from their website; cain.ulst.ac.uk/bogsideartists. Perhaps the last word is best left to visiting American poet Craig Czury.

BOGSIDE MURALS
at a glance
will arrest you
will stop you in your tracks
and search you
armed with stone and mortar
full force in the face
painting these wall must have been a fistfight
plastic bullet words
petrol bomb brushstrokes
paint stirred in the blood
with blood and smoke
there will never be a peace settlement between
mural billboard graffiti
no plaster decommissioning
when these walls start talking to you
it is time to rethink your life.