Cultivating Queer Disabled Visions

Taking place in November 2025 – This mentored artistic residency brings together two Irish professional artists working across live art, writing, drawing, and sound to cultivate queer disabled visions through environmental storytelling and embodied practice. The project will explore how queer narratives intertwine with natural landscapes, inviting participants to dance with and as unnatural plants while discovering pathways to resilience and healing pleasure.

Workshop: 7th-9th November

Residency: The residency is between the dates of 30th October- 29th November, with ideally a minimum of a 3 week stay. It’s essential to be at the residency for the workshop period of 7th-9th November. 

Chronic Collective is a multidisciplinary curatorial art collective with a strong focus on accessibility in the
arts. The collective is run by two queer and chronically ill artists, Tara Carroll and Áine O’Hara. They create
opportunities to platform disabled and/or chronically ill artists’ work in a supportive and care focused
environment catering to individual needs with a view to alleviating some of the barriers faced when creating and exhibiting work. Structuring events and workshops to a more sustainable and flexible pace, with quiet low light rest areas, comfortable spaces, snacks and plenty of breaks which benefits both artists and audience.

Tara Carroll‘s multidisciplinary practice rests upon the perception of the body, impacted by historical
narratives; and its placement in an individualistic society. Through difficult times of embodied conflicts of Tara’s lived experiences as a queer disabled person, community empowered them to carve new pathways of creativity and caring for themselves.

Áine O’Hara is an award winning visual artist, theatre maker and facilitator focused on creating exciting and vulnerable work for and about people who are often left out of traditional art and performance spaces. Áine’s work spans mediums and is interested in community building, accessibility and care.

Apply here

The residency creates an immersive sanctuary where disabled and non-disabled participants can move alongside disabled performance artists and live artists, sharing in rich, communal movement rituals that center joy and nourishment. Through this collaborative cultivation, we aim to grow new possibilities for embodiment, connection, and creative expression that honor the full spectrum of human experience.

Set within the living landscape of Milford House, the artists will work intimately with the surrounding plant life and trees, allowing the land itself to become a co-creator in cultivating these visions. The natural world will serve as both inspiration and collaborator, reflecting themes of growth, adaptation, and the beautiful complexity of diverse ecosystems.

The program weaves together guided workshops and activities with time for self-directed exploration and reflection. Throughout the residency, we maintain Live Art Ireland’s Vulnerable Adult Protection Policy, ensuring a safe and supportive environment for all workshop leaders and participating artists.

A mentored workshop forms the heart of the residency experience, offering structured space for deepening practice, sharing discoveries, and collectively tending to the emerging visions that grow from this unique intersection of queerness, disability, artmaking, and environmental connection.

Thank you to the Arts Act Grant from Tipperary Arts Office at Tipperary Council and the Workspaces Grant from the Arts Council