A Lost Fragment of Desmond Kinney’s Sweeney Astray

A Lost Fragment of Desmond Kinney’s Sweeney Astray

I used AI to improve the image.

The Encounter: 8 September 2019 The story begins with a single, hurried image taken on 8 September 2019. I was inside the Irish Life Centre complex, photographing a striking mosaic figure—a woman possessing the body of a blue and white bird.

It was a rushed job. As I snapped the shutter, a security grille began to descend, threatening to trap me inside the complex. I escaped just in time, but in the chaos, the exact identity of the artwork remained a blur.

A Case of Mistaken Identity For a long time, I misidentified this figure. I assumed it was a section of Desmond Kinney’s famous Táin Wall (depicting The Cattle Raid of Cooley), located nearby at the Setanta Centre on Nassau Street.

The logic seemed sound at the time: the figure strongly resembled The Morrígan, the Celtic war goddess who frequently appears as a crow or raven. However, when I recently asked an AI to cross-reference this 2019 image with older files in the Infomatique archive, it flagged a contradiction.

The Archive Dig: Sweeney Astray The archive holds extensive images of the Táin Wall prior to its removal. Upon analysis, the discrepancy became obvious: the Táin style consists of earthy reds, browns, and warriors. It did not match the cool blues and whites of my Bird Woman.

Instead, the investigation pointed to a folder from March 2011, containing photos of a completely different Kinney work: Sweeney Astray at the Irish Life Centre.

The Anomaly: A Ghost in the Machine This discovery created a timeline problem. My original notes from that 2011 shoot read:

"THIS NO LONGER EXISTS — SWEENEY ASTRAY BY DESMOND KINNEY. The photographs date from 2011... In July 2013 it was reported that 'A historical mural was ripped off the Irish Life building and put in black bags'. My understanding is that such murals have a limited life expectancy..."

Here lay the mystery. The official record—and my own notes—stated that Sweeney Astray was destroyed in 2013 due to rot. Yet, my photograph of the Bird Woman, which is clearly a stylistic match for the Sweeney mural, was dated September 2019.

Conclusion While the main exterior wall was indeed removed and destroyed, the archive proves that a single fragment—the Bird Woman—survived on a pillar inside the complex for at least six years longer than the public believed. She was a ghost hiding in plain sight.

Next Steps I intend to return to the location within the next few days to determine if the Bird Woman mural remains accessible to the public today.