c.r.o.w.

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5 Minutes from Here the collaborative walk with Master of Fine Art (MFA) students from the University of Ulster Under the M3 off Nelson St was our first port of call, a probable 3 minute walk from the art college, our initial point of departure. Jade was surprised to find so much foliage and greenery under the motorway but also pointed out an array of faded football stickers on the railings.

We walked parallel and under the M3 until we arrived at Corporation St. car park where the clampers were in action. Our wall walking, on the invitation of Katrina, to circumnavigate the car park couldn’t muster a smile from the clampers but caught the eye of many an amused passing motorist. We jump from the wall in unison and progress across the Dunbar link to Talbot street and on down Donegall St to our next destination Commercial court.

Andrew points out an elevated, but semi hidden, Larkin afloat a wall down the dead end ally off Donegal St. The stature of the trade unionist of 1913 Lockout fame, by Anto Brennan, is a smaller copy of an original which presides over Dublin’s O’ Connell St. however this is not the only Larkin in Belfast, as we find out later. Moving on we duke down Commercial Court, home of the Duke of York as Erin wants to see the alley in the cold light of day. The geranium baskets are being stripped back for the winter under the watchful gaze of an owl and a kestrel. There are some Salvador Dali images here too but we leave with the image of the birds of prey flanking the alley.

We make our way down Rosmary St for a visit to the RGB gallery where the facilities house another Larkin in waiting. He stands, on the eve of the centenary of the 1913 lockout, flanked by 2 urinals and a mop bucket behind a washing line pegged with negative ends. A very un-public sculpture.

Lastly we stride up Clifton St with Rosanna to find a derelict printers which stands Alamo like on some waste ground site of former Unity flats. The territory looks ripe for bush drinking with random piles of semi charred wood and plastic street cordons. There is a gap in the fence blocking access to a path running parallel to the motorway, this looks promising. We disperse with this in mind.

'Belfast from Above' Wednesday 5th Oct, 2011
Collaboration with MA Art in Public, organised by S. Bosch
A visit to:
The roof of the old Co Op building, now the Art College, University of Ulster
The roof of Castlecourt (The Poor Man's Pompideau)
The top of the Victoria Centre

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Plumbers in the basement’

In ‘Belfast from above’, we climbed three buildings in Belfast: The roof of the Orpheus Building, an Art Deco architecture from 1932, former Belfast Cooperative Society and nowadays part of the Art College on York Street; the top parking lot of CastleCourt, a shopping centre from 1990 on Royal Avenue and the glass dome of Victoria Square, the latest commercial, residential and leisure development in Belfast from 2008. All three of them are located in the city centre and are connected to shopping as a city centre activity.

As we walked from one place to the next, we came across the abandoned Haymarket Arcades and the Smithfield Market, a place for odd treasures. We passed sex shops and school uniform shops, parking lots on interfaces and lots of vacant, fenced spaces in the city centre. We went through Castle Street to look at the map of the former structure, bought a treat in a local bakery and heard Dan and Aisling point out the arts venues on that side of Castle Court.

The tour was attended by newcomers to Belfast and local ‘experts’ and it was fascinating to hear personal accounts. These accounts gave a colour to certain spots, be it the downtown checkpoints and being stripped, the story about the construction of CastleCourt under constant bomb scares and attacks (‘Plumbers in the basement’ is the code sentence for a bomb scare in CastleCourt transmitted over the sound system of the shopping center in case of emergency), the burning out of certain buildings in town and made it a tour through presence and history. Social rupture, but also functional social spaces such as music venues in town and even the shopping centers shifted the image from black and white. Questions arose such s the meaning of the river and harbor nowadays, the role of shopping in Belfast, the role of citizens in downtown, the issues of private or public. The research of Forum for Alternative Belfast was a huge help for the tour.

Susanne Bosch, 6th October 2011

Belfast from above

All familiar places for me but the tour was not without food for thought.

Each place has had some significant resonance for my artistic life.

Top of art college.
Unbeknown to anyone (until the video later) I abseiled from this roof one summer night and camped on a roof top below. The following morning I abseiled off that roof to get down to the street and made my way in college as normal.

Top of Castlecourt carpark:
From here I took a picture of our now demolished studio (Orchid Studios). This image after some major background editing became an icon of the studio – we used it for invites to shows and parties. The background is from an old etching of the view to Oldpark and Cave Hill (looking North) from about the location of Castlecourt today. Orchid used to be in the Orchid Bar which was a famous dance venue in the 50’s and 60’s. We had sprung floors in our studios. On the ground floor was a scary (if you had an English accent) bar called Cheers where we collected our post from. Now an Ibis hotel stands in its place.

Victoria Arcade dome:
Recently opened, several AIP students have had projects, encounters and interactions with the place. Of all the newly built spaces in Belfast in this one we seem to most clearly encounter the hidden realities of seemingly public space. We’ve been chased off by security people for carrying cardboard mountains (with Sinead Conlon) but also at other time been given blessing to host bird watching sessions (with Bernadine Carroll). The view is interesting to me so is the sense of its spectacularisation through the architecture and all set within a consumer environment. I’m echoing Guy Debord here I guess. I’m often in high vertiginous situations but here it is different it’s laid on, made safe, cold and sterile. It’s the retail architecture equivalent of 3D TV – passive entertainment designed to increase consumption.

The carpark had most interest for me – it has so many view points and places to get a fix on – from hills east and west to the cranes to city hall and the close grain buildings around Castle St. - fascinating. I also liked the fact that you can see the top of the shopping arcade (the “beautiful” sky you see from the “streets” inside) – it reminds me of seeing behind the scenes of the theme park.

New thought: what if you had a leak in the basement would it ever get fixed?

Dan Shipsides

Belfast From Above.
A C.R.O.W.’s - eye view

120 steps
From A to F
Only Block 81 maintains a constant measure
12 treads to a flight
Staunchly imperial
Old School
1932, when down the road in Dublin
They celebrated the Eucharistic Congress
And Count John McCormack sang
Panus Angelicus on O’Connell Bridge
Rome Rule is right!
On the roof,
Maybe because it was a day when the sky
Was closer than the enclosing hills,
My eye was more for the detail.
There was talk of spires
And fires
And grand plans for a new universe-city
-Watch this space.

Castlecourt was castellar indeed from behind,
Cathedraled above the remnants
Of a street market culture.
A stairway,
A throwback to Art Deco,
Unintentional I suppose.
From the roof
The distant Docks, almost impenetrable, and a river
That failed to make its presence felt
In a City emanating from a square
Where,
Oddly enough,
It could be difficult to distinguish
North from South,
And East from West.
A 19th Century Boomtown
A Bombtown in the 20th.
Immediately below us the Black Taxis
That once went where busses feared to thread
Now more of a novelty,
And the location of one of the Last of the gates to come down
That gripped the city in a ring of steel.
I saw them myself in the 80s
And marveled at how people managed
To carry on.

Séamus Dunbar
5/10/2011

I arrived at the foyer, our meeting point, and my first meeting of my new classmates and collaborators, excitement and nervousness, mixed with the sweat and adrenaline of the cycle ride in.

Being a rainy and misty day, and my head full of all kinds of thoughts, the whole walk to me took on the atmosphere of a dream, and as with dreams I can only remember abstract snippets of the experience;

The wetness of the art school roof made me want to climb higher, I assume that’s why there was a security guard present, the roof of the ball room now painting studio inside breathed former spender all over me, glad as I was to be dry inside.

We wondered thru the marketspace perusing watches, trinkets and motorcycle boots, stood outside castle court car park and considered its barrier-like presence, built as it was around the time the city was gated, replacing on physical gate with a more phycological one, there where stories of other barrier architecture like the link road carving up the city from its suburbs, the bridge over it I was later told by a friend is known as ‘the bridge too far’ as this is the bridge that shoplifters from castle court shopping centre have to run across if caught, and if they make it to the other side, escape from the police.

The mountain on the one side of the car park is called napoleons nose, due to its nose like qualities, apparently there is caves around there too… images flashed thru my head of me living in a cave, under a big nose.

As we walked over to the ultra modern egg shaped shopping centre, we stopped to criticize some bad public art, a stainless steel bent angle iron monstrosity, a few kicks sent the whole thing wobbling out of control, revealing dodgy welds and dodgier design, wondered if it was covered with some material it would at least serve some purpose.

The long spiral climb to the roof of the egg was worth it when we could see the whole city 360, even see the dock yard, which it seems is generally hid out of view, The grass planted roof of the shopping centre was interesting but a shame there were no other plants or way for the public to access to roof.

Overall an interesting start to the course, a casual walk up and down different parts of a city I barley know.

Robert Ireson

c.r.o.w.

Park Life Treasure Hunt CROW and GROW collaborate

Five Minutes From Here, on route.

'5 minutes from here' map of walk in collaboration with MFA students

'5 Minutes From Here' 11 am Friday 19th Oct, Meet Front of Art College, York St

Belfast From Above

'Belfast from Above' Wednesday 5th Oct, 2011

'Belfast from Above' Wed, 5th Oct, meet University of Ulster, Foyer, York St 10.15am