Belfast artist Danny Devenny on Drawing Support
Danny Devenny’s speech at the Féile an Phobail launch of Drawing Support 5, August 2022
As far as I remember, I must have first met Bill in the early 80s. I thought maybe ’80 or‘ ’81, but he says much later. He had been pointed in my direction by Danny Morrison to discuss an idea he had to publish a book about the murals. My role at the time was with Republican Publications, an off-shoot of the Publicity Department, and Bill was enquiring as to the possibility that maybe we could help out.
I was aware of Bill’s politics and background, through maybe Terry Enwright or Robin Dunwoody, and I was aware he shared similar political views, but I must admit I was a little bewildered why he wanted to publish loyalist murals alongside our own. That aside, we were ourselves in the very early stages of a process of experimentation with full colour and were unfortunately unable to help him anyway. In later years, yes, but back then we would not have been able to offer the standard of printing he was expecting or requiring. I was delighted, though, when I discovered Bill had found funding and had been able to move ahead with his project, publishing Drawing Support 1.
With so many murals included in it outlining republican ideas, arguments and demands, it was free publicity!
Previously having produced a calendar from 1982 based solely on these dramatic, recently arrived in the nationalist community murals documenting republicanism, I was already well aware of the potential audience for such material, both here and abroad. We had to reprint that calendar not once, but twice, due to the demand. That was quite unique. Normally we would end up each year with boxes of unsold calendars blocking the door to offices of Tom Cahill and Seany Overend in Sevastopol Street.
The book’s quality and political perspective are a tribute to the author. And as for my confusion regarding the publishing of loyalist murals alongside ours, as my good friend, mural historian and anthropologist Prof Jack Conway pointed out: ‘Sure, Dan, it helps distinguish who the good guys are’.
The murals when they first started to appear were a godsend to the Sinn Féin Publicity Department, but where Bill sought out the artworks, we were more interested in hunting down the young artists. Danny Morrison found them and made the introductions. He knew a lot of them who lived close by. Most of the first murals appeared around the Beechmount area. Dominic and Marty Lyons, big Marty Monaghan, Kes Mervy, Tim Brannigan and last but not lease, Jackie Burt, Anna Gallagher and Johnny Jameson. These are only a few, but I mention them because when we invited them to come and work full-time with us, nearly all agreed. Andrea Redmond and big Micky Doc should also be noted for their contribution to murals down the years. And Seando too.
Remembering that period I can’t help but recall the quote from Bobby Sands: ‘Everyone has a role to play’.
These kids, most of them still in their mid-teens, played a blinder. It was they and others who first introduced us to republican mural art. Today, over forty years later, here we are to witness the fifth volume of Bill’s books documenting the art they kicked off and the new medium they created. Who could not applaud this and commend the truly revolutionary spirit, vision and courage of these young people. Remember, it was not a game. There were no big funding grants, no arts bodies wishing to support them. There were no personalities arranged for unveilings; in fact, there weren’t any unveilings.
What there was was threats and in the case of 16-year-old Michael McCartan in 1980, murder. Shot dead by the RUC for carrying a tin of white paint and a brush to scrawl his support for the IRA on a gable wall. Pat Finucane and Des Wilson organised a public meeting to expose the atrocity. Pat was targeted and murdered for his passion to work in pursuit of justice and his determination to expose the corrupt nature of the state. We were honoured to produce murals in his memory.
For those of you who are unaware of how Bill came up with the title of his first mural collection … During an interview with Kes for his first volume, Bill enquired of the then 17-year-old, ‘What is it that you are doing with this and what inspire you?’ Big Kes, in his even bigger monotone Belfast accent, replied: ‘We’re just drawing support for the lads’.
I’d like to say we have all remained close friends, comrades even; some are even family and no, not just republican family; my brother-in-law married Jackie and Marty is with Donna, Jackie’s sister.
Talking of young Michael McCartan, not only were the young muralists victims of continued and at times brutal intimidation and harassment by the RUC and British army, the loyalist groups also issued threats, including them as ‘considered legitimate targets’.
As for me, thinking back, I see myself as the Great Pretender. I have spent over 30 years now producing hundreds of murals, painting scores of gable walls across the city, painting banners, backdrops, etc. Back then it was the last thing I would have guessed I would eventually end up doing. What is that quote from John Lennon? ‘Life is what happens to you when you are busy making other plans.’ In gaol I had done some; around 1975 my and Dee Delaney’s cell was decorated with a mural of Jim Fitzpatrick’s Eiru and a splendid psychedelic Jimi Hendrix. I even did a Jungle Book mural for Gerald Basher Burns as well.
After my release Tom Hartley, whom I had got to know, had me painting billboards in support of the POWs and the mounting horrors of H Block. Not long after that, I was kidnapped by him and Danny and shoehorned into a job designing and assembling Republican News. They had a disagreement with the then designer, a great friend and mentor of mine, Sean Morris. Back then Sean was not only responsible for the paper but he was creator and designer of most posters, leaflets, etc. Sean’s ‘Split Brit’ and ‘Freedom ’73, 74, 75’ posters are now part of republican folklore. So, anyway, I’m being told I have to take on this role as part of the Publicity Department. My family, particularly my mother, were delighted. Says she, ‘That’s great. Sure, you are hardly likely to go to gaol or get shot again doing that’. How wrong she was! Thanks to little Roy Mason, before the year was out, we were all back in jail – that is, the editorial board of Republican News and several members of Belfast Sinn Féin. I think someone had cried a scud on me for in 1981; I also managed to get myself shot again.
The imprisonment did not last long, less than a year, but the intimidation and threats did, which resulted in no printing firms being willing to produce our publicity material. Jim Gibney and others pushed to amalgamate the two weekly newspapers (An Phoblacht and Republican News) and move the operation down South. A printing firm was found in Portlaoise and a production/editorial facility was established on the second floor of Sinn Féin’s head office at 44 Parnell Square, Dublin. This new facility allowed us to broaden our publicity output and many of the aforementioned muralists became part of the team and were allocated a variety of roles. Not that they stopped painting murals, but the Publicity Department now needed paste-up artists, typesetters, camera operators and so on.
My role within all this was, apart from paste-up and design, creating visuals to illustrate the many reports, letters, articles and news filling the pages of our papers and magazines.
As I said earlier, the arrival of painted murals was a godsend to me. Many of the original ones used copies of images I had created in the paper or in posters. I was eager to use these as illustrations and, realizing the difficulties in producing original ideas without access to contemporary photos, I wanted to offer them access to our growing photographic and historical archive. At one point, Danny Morrison set up a system whereby he would suggest a topic, hand it to me to create a mock-up, and then, having passed the usual hundred thousand double checks and clearance at committee stage, deliver it to the kids to muralise it.
Not all the murals were created this way. I’m thinking of Kes Mervyn’s recreation of the black and white poster the Iranians sent us in solidarity with the hungers strikers, or even his adventure into poetry on Beechmount Avenue: ‘Margaret Thatcher think again, Don’t let our brave boys die in vain’.
I myself did not venture into murals and head outdoors with a paint brush until 1991. I am sure of the date because Alex Maskey had approached me and asked would I do a mural at the top of the Shaws Road to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the death of Volunteer Joe McDonnell. At the time I had been helping set up the Sinn Féin video department at Conway Mill and for the life of me I don’t know how Alex knew that I could even paint because I wasn’t too sure myself. So, I called for back-up, more seasoned painters to help out. Kes, I think, was there, Mo Chara for sure and I eventually used the sign-writing skills of my great friend Sean Morris to finish the project.
It must have been successful, for within a week, the Brits, maybe the peelers, possibly both, arrived up under cover of darkness and paint-bombed it. We had it repaired within an hour or so and, returning to my day job, video production, we were even able to use the mural as the primary visual in a video we also produced to mark Joe McDonnell’s anniversary.
I think it was about then that I started to understand the power behind these painted gable walls. It seemed to me after that project for Alex, all you needed was a blank wall, a couple of buckets of paint, a few friends and many times not even that, and an idea – you could have hundreds, maybe thousands discussing, examining, debating, recalling the courage and sacrifice not just of the POWs but of the resistance liberation struggle itself – and at zero cost. I was well aware just how much the publicity work would cost. It could take literally several hundred pounds to produce/publish/circulate a poster, and then sit back and hope equally hundreds of people would see it and absorb our message. With a mural, all you needed was an idea – mostly a grievance – but not always. Your image, once created, and accompanying statement would be picked up by all the passing press crews and, even better till, TV crews. Lazy camera crews who could not be arsed would plonk the anchor person in front of a big wall with a mural expressing unreserved support for the Irish struggle and even while their frontman was delivering verbatim the lies of the latest Northern Ireland Office press release, saying Sinn Féin had no support, the audience out there weren’t fooled.
It could not be more simple: an idea and a gable wall was all that was needed. You did need paint, but really, whatever paint was available would do. Whatever paint was available became the colour scheme for the next project. We would mostly watch for people in the street painting their houses. I remember one when that lovely gent Jim McCabe asked for a mural to mark the anniversary of the murder of his young wife Nora and all the other victims of plastic bullets. All we had to work with was a half tin of brown and about five litres of cream paint. A wee bit of red was needed to sort out the image of a Gerry McLoughlin poster I wanted to use. The usual provider, my wife Deborah, came up with the money to buy the small tin. When finished, Jim and the plastic bullet committee loved it.
The original, which was painted on plywood and then assembled on the wall, remained there for years. Eventually, as the wood disintegrated, the committee had it copied photographically and I think it is still there today just up the street from here. Once again, thanks to Bill, it is recorded for posterity. The image that the truth within it are still available for those interested in learning about the Irish struggle.
To end up, there is one example I would like to share if anyone is still doubtful regarding the power of political murals. Back in the mid-90s myself and my lifetime partner in crime, Marty Lyon, were called over to the lower Ormeau to draw attention to the ongoing sectarian intimidation visited on that community each year by Orange bands. Local activists, aware of the fear and rising tension among younger kids, requested we work with them and through art and painting create maybe a little bit of distraction for them. I had this idea, based on a cartoon I had seen in the Dublin Star newspaper – first time for me to plagiarise any cartoonists other than our own Brian Moore, aka Cormac. The image compared Mo Mowlam to Pontius Pilate turning a blind eye to the threatening and bellicose reality that is Orange parades.
It took Marty and myself only an hour or two to complete it from start to finish, but while painting we were interrupted by an ABC TV crew seeking permission to film us and requesting an interview. The next morning, when Marty and Geraldo, our driver, and myself returned to collect all our brushes and stuff, the same TV crew approached us smiling, hand out, wishing to thank us again. They said their bosses back in the States were delighted. They had shot it in time lapse. Not only was he able by using our image to explain the duplicity of the British government, but they were able to syndicate their report. It had been watched by over 40 million people nationwide.
I recall that incident here at the launch of Bill’s fifth edition because I’m hearing, taking in all five publications, his readership worldwide is closing in on the ABC count of 40 million! So let’s outnumber them; get your copy! Better still, why stop at one. Get several. Share them with family and friends and neighbours.
Was it Winston Churchill said, ‘History is written by the winners’. Bill’s books fall into that category. The people who created these works are part of that freedom walk that led us to today’s reality.
Adh mór.