Little VISUAL Early Years Workshops

What to Expect

Little VISUAL is a weekly early years workshop at VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art, built for children aged 1 to 4 and the adult who brings them. Artist Marian Balfe leads each Thursday morning session, which pairs a short walk through the current gallery exhibitions with a hands-on sensory or messy-play activity in the studio space afterwards. The activity changes week to week, so families who come back through the run get monoprinting one Thursday and dough, sensory bags or wildflower work the next.

The sessions are deliberately loose for children of this age. There is no expectation of a finished piece of artwork and no sitting still: the point is exposure to colour, texture, mess and the gallery itself. VISUAL is Carlow’s main contemporary art gallery and also houses the George Bernard Shaw Theatre, so plenty of parents make a morning of it and walk the exhibitions afterwards while the small people wind down. The current run started on 6 August and continues every Thursday to 24 September 2026.

Good to Know

• Every Thursday to 24 September 2026, 10:00am to 11:00am. This listing is dated to Thursday 20 August, the next session.
• Venue: VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art, Old Dublin Road, Carlow.
• €5 per child, and each child ticket includes one adult ticket.
• Every child needs a valid ticket booked in advance; book online through VISUAL’s Ticketsolve page, by phone on 059 917 2400, or in person at the box office.
• Dress children in clothes you do not mind wrecking, as the sessions involve paint, dough and other messy materials.
• Tickets are non-refundable and non-transferable, so tell the box office if you cannot make it and free the place up.
• Wheelchair users and groups over eight should book directly through the box office.

Getting There

VISUAL is on the Old Dublin Road in the grounds of Carlow College, about ten minutes on foot from the town centre and Tullow Street. There is on-site car parking for visitors, which is the easier option with a buggy. Carlow railway station is roughly a fifteen-minute walk away.