June 10 | Lunch and Learn with Scott Sawtell
Wednesday, June 10, 2026
12:30 to 1:30 PM
Free | Online | Zoom link provided upon registration
About the Program
Take your lunch break with us and join a free online talk with Scott Sawtell, featured artist from the Varley Art Gallery’s summer exhibition What holds us together. This session offers insight into Sawtell’s creative process and current work.
About the Artist
Scott Sawtell is a painter based in the Greater Toronto Area who has exhibited his work for over 25 years across Canada and the United States. Working from his suburban studio, his practice explores contemporary painting through a sustained and dedicated studio approach. Sawtell holds an MFA from the University of Waterloo and is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design. Alongside his studio practice, he has taught at Georgian College, OCAD University, and Brock University, and has curated exhibitions for institutions including the Town of Newmarket, the City of Kitchener, Oakville Galleries, and Humber College. He is currently focused on the continued development of his painting practice.
About the Exhibition
The artists in this exhibition work within states of in‑betweenness, using painting to assemble the memories, relationships, and events that shape their identities. Through layered processes and intuitive construction, they build worlds that hold them together—worlds offering coherence amid shifting selves and unstable histories. Par Nair reframes gender roles through intimate engagements with personal archives and memory; Scott Sawtell probes psychological tension through gestural contradictions and unconscious imagery; and Vicky Talwar evokes spiritual reflection through natural elements and symbolic layering.
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. Their works become spaces of reflection and restoration, creating openings for connection, comfort, or possibility. 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.
