Most people are familiar with the seven leaders who signed the proclamation declaring a republic in the 1916 Easter rising, Connolly, Pearse, Plunkett, Mac Diarmada, Ceannt ,Clarke and Mac Donagh. However there were an additional nine volunteers who were executed along with the leaders. They were : Thomas Kent, Michael O’Halloran, Con Colbert, Edward Daly, John Mc Bride, Michael Mallin, Michael O’Hanrahan, Roger Casement, Sean Hueston and William Pearse.

Ballyfermot Youth Service have put together a graphic and photo exhibition of all these leaders of 1916. As part of the project a group of young people thought it was also important to include three additional leaders as they had played a vital part in our history of that period:
Michael Collins, Constance Markievicz and Eamon De Valera .

Working with an Italian Graphic Artist Robetto Tusa from Tortona in Italy, who is a European Volunteer on a Erasmus programme with Ballyfermot Youth Service, 20 young people have taken original photos of the sixteen leaders and used poster style technique to enhance the images, using vibrant colours of reds, greens, blues and yellows .

Each young person’s task was to decide on the leader they identified with. They looked
at the words in the proclamation and picked three words that represented their ideas and vision about this revolutionary period and what it meant to them as young people in today’s Ireland.

They then incorporated these words together with their own photo alongside the image of the leader. The images are printed on large polyboards and create an explosion of colour and imagination. In addition to the exhibition street banners were displayed on the main shopping street in Ballyfermot.

The exhibition was launched by the Lord Mayor, Críona Ní Dhálaigh on 18th Jan 2016 in Ballyfermot Library. The event was widely covered in the print & television media.