Varley Art Gallery to launch Summer Exhibitions

An educator with the York Region District School Board whose work has been exhibited nationally and internationally is among three artists whose works will be featured in one of the Varley Art Gallery’s 2026 Summer Exhibitions.

Vicky Talwar is an interdisciplinary artist whose work draws on her experiences as a Hindu Canadian. She evokes spiritual reflection through natural elements and symbolic layering, the gallery says.

The ‘What holds us together’ exhibition also features artist Par Nair, who reframes gender roles through intimate engagements with personal archives and memory. Artist Scott Sawtell probes psychological tension through gestural contradictions and unconscious imagery, it adds.

“While their approaches differ, all three artists treat painting as an act of care, one that nurtures resilience, reveals buried narratives, and creates room for freedom from social and cultural expectations,” the gallery says. “Together, their practices unfold within the shared context of living and working in York Region, a place shaped by cultural plurality and continual transformation. This geographical backdrop echoes the fluidity and complexity of their individual production, grounding each abstract language within the here and now.”

In the 1950s, Frederick Varley wandered the halls of Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) with pencil in hand. The exhibition, Sketching the Past, invites visitors to share in the careful observations he made, and to think about why we visit museums: to see, record and reflect.  Meanwhile, the Emerging Artist Spotlight features Hayley Chi Hay Chiu, a Toronto-based, second-generation Chinese Canadian painter who works primarily in oil. Her practice traces an ongoing journey of becoming and a search for ‘home,’ reimagining personal narratives through fable and fantasy, the gallery says.

You’re invited to the opening reception of the Varley Art Gallery’s 2026 Summer Exhibitions on May 23 from 2 to 4 p.m. Meet the exhibiting artists and curator Anik Gluade, enjoy a sound healing performance and take part in interactive activities. Light refreshments will be served. The event is free, and registration is not required.

The summer exhibitions run through September 7.