SWEENEY ASTRAY BY DESMOND KINNEY - HAS BEEN DESTROTED

SWEENEY ASTRAY BY DESMOND KINNEY

WISHING HAND SCULPTURE VERONICA GUERIN MEMORIAL CELTIC SERPENT AT DUBLIN CASTLE SPECIAL OLYMPICS SCULPTURE BY JOHN BEHAN THREE STATUES - MOVED TO KINGS INNS ANNA LIVIA BRONZE BY EAMONN O'DOHERTY WHO MADE THE WORLD BY CLIODHNA CUSSEN ARCHER II BY NIALL O'NEILL THE MOTHERSHIP UNIVERSAL LINKS OF HUMAN RIGHTS BY TONY O’MALLY HEALING HANDS BY TONY O'MALLY IRISH AMERICAN SCULPTOR 1874 - 1943 ÉIRE MEMORIAL BY JEROME CONNOR SEAN HEUSTON BY LAURENCE CAMPBELL TREE OF GOLD AT THE CENTRAL BANK IN DAME STREET PUBLIC ART AT YORK ROAD BRONZE STATUE OF JOHN PAUL II BRENDAN BEHAN AT BINN'S BRIDGE FOUR MASTER CELTIC CROSS A LARGE SCULPTURE OISIN KELLY METAL SULPTURE - ADELAIDE ROAD THE BEST NIGHT EVER BY BOB QUINN THE LIBERTY BELL BY VIVIENNE ROCHE OSCAR WILDE SCULPTURE IN MERRION SQUARE PARK VICTIMS BY ANDREW O'CONNOR HOW TO CAMOUFLAGE THE FOUNDATIONS OF A BUILDING THAT WAS NOT COMPLETED THE STEINE SCULPTURE BY CLIODHNA CUSSEN 3D PRINTED PINK SCULPTURE BY JAM SUTTON THE THREE ELEMENTS TO THE OSCAR WILDE SCULPTURE BY DANNY OSBORNE - 18 JULY 2020 WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS MEMORIAL BY HENRY MOORE EARLSFORT TERRACE PLAZA - THE SCULPTURE FEATURING BIRDS IN FLIGHT HAS BEEN REPLACED STATUE OF PATRICK KAVANAGH NORTH BANK OF GRAND CANAL ON MESPIL ROAD OSCAR WILDE SCULPTURE BY DANNY OSBORNE - THREE ELEMENTS THOMAS DAVIS STATUE AND FOUNTAIN BY EDWARD DELANEY - NO WATER TO BE SEEN LEAN BY CAOIMHE KILFEATHER THE KISS BY ROWAN GILLESPIE - PHOTOGRAPHED IN APRIL 2017 THIS WATER FEATURE HAD BEEN REMOVED SWEENEY ASTRAY BY DESMOND KINNEY - HAS BEEN DESTROYED BLACKROCK DOLEMEN BY ROWAN GILLESPIE ANOTHER RED METAL YOKE - NEWTOWN AVENUE SEAPOINT HARMONY A SCULPTURE BY SANDRA BELL - PEARSE SQUARE PUBLIC PARK TWO STYLISED FIGURES WITH THE OLYMPIC FLAME - SPECIAL OLYMPICS MEMORIAL BY JOHN BEHAN STATUE OF LUKE KELLY ON SLOUTH KING STREET - BY JOHN COLL THE BRONZE COW DECIDED TO MOVE FROM WOLFE TONE SQUARE TO WOOD QUAY WHERE THE GRASS IS GREENER TRIBUTE HEAD II IN MERRION SQUARE PARK FAMINE MEMORIAL BY EDWARD DELANEY OCTOBER 2020 TRIBUTE TO DERMOT MORGAN - FATHER TED IN IRELAND THERE IS A LOVE AFFAIR WITH RED METAL SCULPTURES - THIS ONE IS ON BAGGOT STREET BRIAN FRIEL AND JOHN B KEANE BY NEIL C BREEN VICTIMS BY ANDREW O'CONNOR THE MOTHERSHIP BY RACHEL JOYNT - NEWTOWNSMITH SOMEWHERE BETWEEN DUN LAOGHAIRE TOWN AND GLASTHULE NIALL O'NEILL'S ARCHER II DUBLIN'S LAST SUPPER 2004 BY JOHN BYRNE

THIS NO LONGER EXISTS - SWEENEY ASTRAY BY DESMOND KINNEY


The photographs date from 2011 so the quality is not as good as I would like. This mural was located at the Irish Life Center [now the Talbot Mall] on Lower Abbey Street.

I photographed this in March 2011 but in July 2013 it was removed. According to one report " A historical mural was ripped off Irish Life building and put in black bags".

My understanding is that such murals have a limited life expectancy especially if they are not well maintained.

Derry artist Desmond Kinney, who completed the work 26 more than thirty years ago, had 29 other works around the city including on Nassau Street and on the AIB centre.

The art work - Sweeney Astray - was a glass mosaic consisting of twelve panels depicting the story of Sweeney’s wanderings through forests and hills, from prose and poems dating back to the 1600s and updated by Seamus Heaney in the early 1980s.

Desmond Kinney (1934-2014) was born in Portstewart, Co. Derry in 1934 and studied at the Belfast College of Art where his contemporaries included Basil Blackshaw, T.P. Flanagan and Cherith McKinstry. In the 1960’s, Kinney established the innovative graphic design studio Kinney/Dobson, the first of its kind in Ireland to achieve International recognition. Kinney is also well-known for his very large-scale murals, mainly in mosaic.

In 1971 Desmond Kinney designed the The Song of Wandering Aengus mosaic for AIB bank inD ublin. He was influenced by Seamus Heaney to use the poem by WB Yeats and this interior mosaic symbolises the last lines of the poem:

I will find out where she has gone.... And pluck till time and times are done The silver apples of the moon
The golden applies of the sun.

The AIB mosaic was removed from Dublin in the 80s and found a home in the Glucksman Library Board Room foyer some time later. The University of Limerick has further links with this poem as the crèche is called Silver Apples after the poem and the last 3 lines of the poem are carved on the foundation stone of the University.




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