Between 1969 and 1998, the capital of Northern Ireland experienced a period of extreme tension, and divisions are still evident in Belfast.
Murals in Belfast (and are also present in many other Northern Irish cities) originated in the first half of the 1900s as a form of collective protest to commemorate historical events and political opinions.
The Gaeltacht Quarter, in West Belfast, is the area with the greatest concentration of murals.
They are divided into two broad categories, which belong to the two souls of the city: the republican front and the loyalist side.
Republican murals depict political themes, historical events, and current issues, but after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the themes depicted have focused solely on domestic politics. The most famous depict the rising phoenix, symbolizing Ireland reborn from the ashes of the Easter Rising, and the face of Bobby Sands, a political activist who died following a hunger strike.
Unlike the republican style, the loyalist one has always been distinguished by its provocative features and a deep sense of loyalty to the British crown.
The main subjects of the loyalist murals are military elements, images of King William III, the Red Hand of Ulster, clenched fists, and references to battles of the First World War.
During the years of greatest political tension, this neighborhood was a veritable battlefield. Divided by different religious orientations since the Victorian era, in 1970, during the Troubles, the Peace Line was built to separate the loyalist and Protestant sections of the neighborhood around Shankhill from the republican and Catholic sections of the Falls Road.
The Peace Line features walls over 8 meters high topped with fences and still divides the Protestant and republican areas. To cross it, there are over 100 gates, which, at the time, were locked every evening by the police. Many windows still have bars to protect them from objects thrown from the other side of the wall.
Despite the peace agreements signed in 1998, they have not yet been dismantled, and it is one of the last remaining border walls in Europe.
The Northern Ireland conflict is often interpreted as a dispute between Protestants and Catholics, but in reality, it was centered on a political issue. Everything revolved around the decision whether Northern Ireland should remain part of the United Kingdom or join the Republic of Ireland.
Heartfelt during the turbulent period of Irish politics and used as a tool for dissent, today the murals have become a tourist attraction, certainly an integral part of Belfast’s history but also an uncomfortable reminder of its past.
