THE DEPARTMENT OF Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht has announced a €22 million investment in major commemoration projects.

The money will be made available throughout next year in order to ensure that the sites, which are all of historical importance, will be open for the 1916 centenary.

The money, which is being raised from the sale of state assets, will go towards six flagship projects.

• The construction of an extended exhibition and interpretive centre at the GPO – housing a permanent exhibition of the 1916 Easter Rising.
• The adaptation by the OPW of the former courthouse building for use as a new visitor facility for Kilmainham Gaol.
• Refurbishment of the Military Archives building at Cathal Brugha Barracks.
• The project envisages completion of a proposed new visitor centre at Pearse’s Cottage in Ros Muc.
• A Tenement Museum at 14 Henrietta Street as a centre for the exploration of tenement life in North Inner City Dublin.
• The refurbishment of Richmond Barracks, where the leaders of the 1916 Rising were held after their surrender.

Funding will also support the redevelopment of the the National Concert Hall, where the Treaty debates took place, the refurbishment of the National Archives and a year-long programme to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of WB Yeats.

Arts Minister Jimmy Deenihan said that the work was about commemorating a hugely significant decade in Ireland.

“The social and political developments of the decade from 1912 helped to form modern Ireland.

“We are commemorating these momentous events, and the people so closely associated with them, especially in the lead in to the centenary of the Easter Rising of 1916. This funding for 2015 is extremely important in our preparation for that major centenary.”

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