The mural was created in 2011 to mark the 30th anniversary of the 1981 Irish hunger strike. Documentation in the Peter Moloney Collection identifies it as a replacement for an earlier mural and names Francis Hughes as the central figure. Hughes was one of ten republican prisoners who died during the 1981 hunger strike.

The hunger strike took place at the Maze Prison, also known as Long Kesh. The prisoners were protesting against the withdrawal of their special category status, which had allowed them to be treated differently from ordinary prisoners. Bobby Sands, the first of the ten to die, became an internationally recognised symbol of the protest.

The mural forms part of West Belfast's politically charged culture of remembrance. Such works document a republican perspective on the Northern Ireland conflict, linking portraits of individuals with collective commemoration of the hunger strike.