Took this photograph for a gig for the Cleveland Mayo Society – that’s County Mayo, as in Ireland. My job was to create a photo collage for the outgoing Chicago-based Irish Counsel General. The collage pictures were to be selected from images the organization already had from events, etc., as well as an assortment of new photos I would capture of important or notable places to Cleveland’s Irish Community. The Famine Memorial is one of those.

Elegant. Strong. Yet still understated. The memorial itself doesn’t overwhelm the simple message of sorrow and loss for the people who were victims of this genocide in Ireland. Makes me think of all of the lost literary, scientific, intellectual, economic and spiritual contributions that would’ve lifted all of us had those people and their descendants not been denied their rightful chance to live.

 – TMulloy