A stern Stern

Port Gates at Larne

Passenger and freight traffic arriving from Scotland through the Port of Larne, encounter a roundabout/rotary immediately outside the confines of the Port gates.

View as cars & lorries leave the Port.
Who was the idiot who placed the light pole directly in front of the Art work?

The Gateway Sculpture by Paul Hogarth, represents the stern of a ship and is intended as an artistic interpretation of Larne’s maritime history.  The Steel Stern, which has also been dubbed the Harbour Harp stands 12 metres high, and flanked by low stone walls.

The Stern – Larne Harbour Gateway Sculpture

At one time all passenger and freight traffic passed through these waters, but with the introduction of large fast ferries new berths and points of departure were developed in Belfast on the mouth of Belfast Lough.

I am sure that the Artist did not have a washing line in mind when he designed the piece.

During the ‘Marching Season’ in Northern Ireland some elements would hang flags on your granny if she stood on the one spot for more than five minutes.  For a country so obsessed by flags, little respect is shown for them. New flags are placed/hung with great gusto at the end of June and left in place until they look like shredded rags not fit to be used as dusters!

My inner jury is still out on this one.  Size isn’t everything!  Perhaps the light pole and flags spoiled the idea for me.

9 thoughts on “A stern Stern

  1. Grannymar Post author

    I timed my visit badly, a boat load of cars and lorries were on the move and anxious to get on their way, so I was restricted in the angles I could use for taking photos.

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  2. bikehikebabe

    Strings of those colorful flags were everywhere in Bhutan. Something to do with relatives that had died.

    There were no TVs or radios that we knew about in that country. The bus driver told us that Osama din Ladin had been captured & the driver was our news source. That was over two years ago. We were disappointed that it wasn’t true.

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  3. Grannymar Post author

    BHB – Not these flags. The flags above all have a political conitation, and can at times be rather intimidating.

    Baino – They would too!

    BTW – I will have a better one next week.

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  4. Rummuser

    To choose such a sculpture for a harbour shows imagination. And the artist has come up trumps with a creation that does justice to the subject.

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  5. Grannymar Post author

    Nick – If the sculpture was on the approach road to the town from Belfast, It would look well and the traffic coming downhill, have more time and space to appreciate it. The present site is right on top of the port gates (One or two lorry lengths), so you have little time to see it. The local Council paid a small fortune for it and very few of the townsfolk ever see it.

    Ramana – In a different setting, certainly, but on the present spot it is almost suffocating.

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