Take a bow Finola Meredith

Alone among our national journalists, Finola Meredith of the Irish Times took up the issue of the banning of Conrad Atkinson from the Ulster Museum in 1978 in coverage of the revamped museum's reopening.

In today's Irish Times, she notes that the Museum has a small — some would say minimalist — space for 'Troubles' art. But even there there's no Conrad.

As readers of From The Balcony know, his monumental work Silver Liberties; A Souvenir of a Wonderful Anniversary Year was banned from the museum on the insistence of the porters — who were backed by the Trustees.

That piece is now in the Wolverhampton Art Gallery collection, having been bought for a significant five-figure sum.

Writes Meredith: "But there have been damaging controversies too: in 1978, attendants at the museum refused to hang Silver Liberties: A Souvenir of a Wonderful Anniversary Year , Conrad Atkinson’s artwork commemorating Bloody Sunday. The staff’s “work-to-rule” action was backed by the museum’s trustees, and caused a stand-off with the Northern Ireland Arts Council, which described it as “a denial of creative freedom”. “Silver Liberties” is currently held at the Wolverhampton Art Gallery, which has one of the biggest collections of Troubles art in Ireland and Britain. A group of Belfast artists is campaigning to have the piece reinstated in the new Troubles gallery at the museum."

Time to get the story of our war and peace told by means of the visual arts in a West Belfast museum.

Here I am standing in front of Silver Liberties at the Wolverhampton Gallery. It shows the faces of those cut down on Bloody Sunday by the guys we are supposed to buy poppies for, a picture of a baton-wielding Brit taken from a wall in West Belfast, and pictures of people beaten up in police stations in Britain. It's a commentary on how the use of British soldiers on the streets of Belfast and Derry would ultimately lead to the brutalisation of British citizens. We may be the guinea pigs but you'll get yours too was the warning.

There's a clearer image of Silver Liberties in our catalogue for Conrad's 2007 visit to Belfast for his exhibition, Some Birds Singing; Some Wounds Healing which is on the web here.