Paddy Duffy Collection

Welcome/Galleries

Thank you visiting the Paddy Duffy Collection! This is one of three collections of images of murals curated by Extramural Activity, along with the Peter Moloney Collection and the Seosamh Mac Coılle Collection.

The galleries below provide a quick way to view the roughly 6,000 images added to Paddy’s collection so far. Write-ups with descriptions and background information for many individual images are also available – click on each image in the galleries for individual entries or use the search tools in the side-bar on the right (or simply keep scrolling).

Poetic Champions

2026-01-222026-01-22Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

These two panels were created by Ross Wilson (web) along with children from four local Ballymoney schools (BBC | NI World). They portray two famous poets from Northern Ireland, Seamus Heaney and John Hewitt and include a line from a work of each:

Seamus Heaney’s “Believe that a further shore is reachable from here”, comes from The Cure At Troy (youtube).

The quotation from John Hewitt is the first line of the poem I Write For: “I write for my own kind, I do not pitch my voice that every phrase be heard by those who have no choice.”

Castlecroft Square, Ballymoney

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
T08391 T08392

Dunloy Cuchullains

2026-01-212026-01-21Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Dunloy Cuchullains (Fb) is a “GA & CC” [Gaelic athletic & camogie club] in Dunloy [Dún Lathaí], County Antrim. The club was founded in 1908 by Andy Dooey, Bob Black, Dan Boyle and Paddy McCamphill (NI Archive | GAA oral history). Home games are played at Páırc Mhıc Phıaraıs on Bridge Road. The club was Antrim senior football champions in 2025 (RTÉ).

The mural was painted for the club’s centenary in 2008 on the gable of Lilac Terrace in Tullaghans Road in the centre of the village. The central figure is inspired by Jim Fitzpatrick ‘Hurling Match’ (Visual History).

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
T08367c T08366 T08368 T08369

Remembering Is Not So Easy

2026-01-202026-01-20Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

On the anniversary of David Ervine’s death, January 8th, a new board was launched in his memory, with images of Ervine “yearning for peace” in the cages of Long Kesh, where he met Gusty Spence (the pair can be seen together in the middle of the first column of photographs).

After his release, Ervine turned to politics, running unsuccessfully as a PUP candidate for Pottinger in the Belfast City Council elections of 1985 (WP); he would eventually be successful in 1997. In 1998 he was returned by Belfast East in the Assembly election (ARK). He helped bring about the loyalist ceasefire in 1994 – which was read aloud by Spence (youtube) – and was pro-Agreement in 1998 (DIB | Guardian | Slugger).

The information about the Memory Chair sculpture makes mention of Ervine’s boots but it seems they have not survived the mothballing of the sculpture which was last seen on site – boots included – in 2014.

Montrose Street South, replacing the various pieces seen in late 2024’s Today, Everyday, And Always.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
T08341 T08342 T08343 T08344
T08349 T08345 T08348 T08346
T08347 T08350

Kennedy Kane McArthur

2026-01-162026-01-19Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“Kennedy Kane McArthur, Olympic hero, Stockholm 1912, gold medal marathon winner. Dervock born and bred.”

Ken McArthur emigrated from Dervock to Johannesburg, South Africa, at age 20 and ran his first marathon at 28. Four years later, he represented South Africa at the Olympics and was victorious in the marathon (WP). There is footage of the race at olympics.com.

“Portrait paintings by pupils of the William Pinkerton Memorial primary school, Dervock. Homage to Kennedy Kane McArthur, 1881 – 1960, Local hero and Olympian. Dervock born and bred.”

Castlecat Road, Dervock.

The large medallion is in the visitor centre in Townsend Street, Ballymoney. It reads, “To commemorate the victory of Kennedy K. McArthur in the marathon race at the Olympic Games in Stockholm 1912. This memorial of strength and virtue is dedicated by the people of his native district.”

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
T08375 T08376 T08377 T08378 T08379 T08380
T08386

The Armoy Armada

2026-01-162026-01-18Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The “Armoy Armada” was (l-r) Joey Dunlop, Frank Kennedy, Jim Dunlop, Mervyn Robinson (AMRRC). The four formed a team of motorcycle racers from 1977 until 1979 when Kennedy was injured in the North West 200. In memory of the quartet, the Armoy Road Races have been held every July since 2009.

This mural was painted by Oliver McParland (web) in 2020 on a gable of a fast-food shop in Armoy. (For the original photograph, see Classic Motorbikes.) The cruder version in the final image, below, is also in Main Street, on the shutters of the Armoy Motorcycle Road Racing club.

Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2026 Paddy Duffy
T08372 T08371 T08370 T08373 T08374

I’ve Been All Around This World

2026-01-112026-01-17Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The Face was last seen on the Cupar Way war-wall in 2019 (see Please Respect Artwork). It was taken down (for reasons unknown) and put into storage in a works yard off Lanark Way, from where it was stolen it by thieves (perhaps thinking it might be valuable for its metal); it was found abandoned near the Slıabh Dubh car park (Belfast Live).

It has now found a home in a new coffee- and souvenir-shop (called Bean Around The World) that has been punched into the fencing at the top of Cupar Way in the shadow of a business park.

Next to The Face is a map of Ireland and Britain divided into regions, and a montage of black-and-white photographs from the Troubles (at least some of which come from the Belfast Archive Project).

The Face was created by Kevin Killen (web) and “the Students from Impact Training (NI) Ltd, Belfast To celebrate and commemorate the Industrial History and Heritage of Belfast City.”

Battle Of The Somme

2026-01-102026-01-12Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

The badge or insignia of the 36th (Ulster) Division most frequently seen in murals is the one on the left of this board in Ballyduff, combining a red hand on a field of shamrocks with the Union Flag and the harp of the Royal Irish Rifles. The simpler insignia of the 36th Division on the right is being seen more frequently – it features a left-handed red hand, while the other uses a right-handed red hand, as do the flags of Ulster and of Northern Ireland.

Ballyduff Gardens, Newtownabbey, replacing a painted mural seen in It Grows In Fields Where Valour Led.

Three Singers

2026-01-092026-01-15Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

This is a piece of Fintan Magee street-art in the centre of Armagh, showing three singers at a 1950’s talent show in the Tontine Rooms (History Armagh). For the source photograph, see Magee’s instagram post. With support from Armagh City, Banbridge, and Craigavon borough council.

McCrum’s Court, Armagh

Armagh For Sam

2026-01-092026-01-15Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“Ádh mór Ard Mhacha” – The board below is from Armagh’s successful 2024 campaign in the senior football championship. The painted well-wishes in the image above might come from 2002, which is the year of Armagh’s only other All-Ireland win, but perhaps from one of the years in which Armagh were Ulster champions (2004, 2005, 2006 or 2008), as the earliest recorded image of it is from 2010.

Drumbreda Crescent and Culdee Drive, Armagh

Ulster Volunteers

2026-01-092026-01-16Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

These faded Armagh murals have the titles “UVF Gun-Smuggler 1913” and “Arms Training 1913”.

The gun-smuggling mural features not the 1914 gun-running on Clyde Valley – the ship that brought in the weapons and ammunition into Larne – but a motor-car. There was earlier gun-running or bulk gun-purchasing – 175 rifles were bought from Harrods by the Earl Of Lanesborough and sent to Enniskillen (Balaclava Street) and 500 rifles were brought from Manchester in August 1913 (Irish Bayonets). (See also History Ireland.) These perhaps used automobiles for distribution, and the Larne gun-running is described as the first time that the horseless carriage was used in a military operation – there were about 350 vehicles in the “Motor Car Corps” (Angelsey p. 3).

The location of the car, and of the ‘arms training’ in the second mural, are unknown. Here is a 1914 image (Getty) showing tents and a single machine-gun at Ballywalter. The sources of both paintings are unknown.

The murals date back to at least 2012 (see the Peter Moloney Collection).

Gough Avenue, Barrack Hill, Armagh