The Boys in the Making methodology places central importance on the knowledge of each group who are creating a boy, who draw on their lived experiences and observations of life in and beyond their own context, to shape the proposed life journey of the character they have created together. Each iteration of the programme is led by a youth worker/educator and an artist. The programme sees a group of children or young people brought through a creative process to develop a boy character and guide him as he interacts with the world around him. Through conversation, drawing and writing exercises, each group name their boy, describe him as a young child and explore his experiences and related needs as he grows up. The process involves a critical engagement with the world around us as well as a re-imagination of the world, considering how it is and how it could be.

The programme was developed by artist Dr Fiona Whelan and youth workers at Rialto Youth Project. The programme is explicitly pedagogical, underpinned by strong youth work values, seeking to support children and young people to understand the complexities of their gender position and its intersection with other forms of inequality. In 2021, researcher Dr Ciaran Smyth (Vagabond Reviews) was invited to work with the Boys in the Making team to help capture and articulate the  methodology of the programme, and give it its name.

For further insights on the Boys in the Making programme methodology, read:

Boys in the Making: an arts and education programme in conversation with ‘the biology of adversity and resilience’ by Kevin Ryan and Fiona Whelan in the Journal of Political Power Volume 15, 2022 – Issue 2. 

The 3-phase methodology of Boys in the Making was developed in 2018/19 by artist and educator Dr Fiona Whelan and youth workers in Rialto Youth Project, who worked with one group of young men to co-create the life of  Stevie. In the years since, the programme continues to expand in Rialto, and since 2022, is being piloted and developed in a number of educational and community contexts across Dublin, led by new organisations and artists, with 19 boys now co-created by children and young people aged 5-18. Building on the learning from this phase of development, and supported by a partnership with UK-based social art agency Heart of Glass, it is our ambition that the programme’s reach will expand nationally and internationally in the coming years.

In Jan-Feb 2025, Boys in the Making was presented publicly by Fiona Whelan and Rialto Youth Project at NCAD Gallery, in collaboration with Scoil Chiaráin CBS, Aaron Sunderland Carey, Feidlim Cannon, Gary Keegan, Dara Clear, Dr Robert Grant, Dr Ernesto Vasquez del Aguila, Dr Ciaran Smyth, Jim Lawlor, Poppintree Youth Project, Space Forms and Heart of Glass. The exhibition offered the public an opportunity to see inside this ongoing programme, to connect with some of the fictional characters and artworks that have been created to date, and the methodology that gave rise to them. A core component of the exhibition was a month-long programme of events, that facilitated in-depth dialogue in relation to the methodology and the themes emerging. Read some media responses here:

Irish Times feature on Boys in the Making by Patrick Freyne

The Boys in the Making programme focuses on how a boy’s world shapes him and how he shapes it. Themes are not prescribed, instead they emerge through the process as each group is facilitated over time to explore the complexity of life for their boy. Groups identify influencing forces they perceive to be present in their boy’s life, informing him of what choices he may have, while giving direction based on their own knowledge, observations and experiences. What emerges from each process, is a fictitious character living in a real world, who embodies much of the knowledge of his makers.

To date, emerging themes have included: relationships, dominance and violence, gendered identity, the search for dignity and respect, social conditioning, bullying, sexuality, poverty and survival. The boy characters are always located in the same context as the group of young makers, creating the conditions for their lived knowledge to bear on his life.

On 14 Feb 2025, as part of the month long exhibition at NCAD Gallery, Dr Fiona Whelan, Dannielle McKenna (Manager Rialto Youth Project) and research partner Dr Ciaran Smyth convened a one day conference at NCAD titled ‘Boys in the Making: On Masculinity and Method’. The conference critically engaged with the methodology and emerging themes of the Boys in the Making programme and considered some sociological questions around the cultural, economic and political forces mediating masculinity today.

See the conference programme and contributors here:

Boys in the Making: On Masculinity and Method – conference