New exhibition opens Friday at the Owens Art Gallery
After a milestone-packed 2025 marking the Owens Art Gallery’s 130th anniversary, the Sackville gallery is easing back into a more conventional routine. Emily Falvey is director and curator of the Owens. She describes 2026 as a calmer year operationally, with a return to core programming and longer-range planning. I spoke to her during the setup of the most recent exhibit.
“We’re going back to our regular rhythm of exhibitions and we’re doing some planning and getting ready for upcoming exhibitions over the next cycle of four years.”
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Last year’s schedule demanded long lead times and major partnerships with some projects in development for almost half a decade.
“The programs that we realized last year, some of them we’d been working on for five years or more.”
Falvey recalled the Edward Mitchell Bannister exhibition that has recently wrapped at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia.
“We had our anniversary in May, the 130th, and we also had a major exhibition in the fall called Art Equals Work, which was part of a partnership with the Beaverbrook Art Gallery.”
With that busy year behind them, the Owens opens its first exhibition of 2026 on Friday, Jan. 16, with Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms – the final stop of a touring retrospective organized with MSVU Art Gallery.
Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms
MacNutt, a Mount Allison graduate and senior artist originally from Nova Scotia, reflects the Owens’ long-standing relationship with university alumni, and was working with materials and processes well before they became widely used in contemporary practice.
“She is a bit of a groundbreaker in terms of her use of materials, sourcing materials from nature and using local willow and other plant materials to make her work.”
Falvey continued, “That type of work is common right now. But she was doing it in the 70s and definitely laying the groundwork for that. There’s work here from the 70s, 80s, and 90s and she’s still making work, including her most recent.”
According to Falvey, MacNutt’s work spans decades and materials, including sculptural forms woven from willow and later cast in bronze. The exhibition was co-curated with Melanie Colissimo, MSVU Art Gallery director, also a Mount Allison grad.
“She’s almost 90 at this point. She’s been present for all of them and has done artist talks. She’s supposed to be here for the opening this Friday at 7 pm, but the weather might make it difficult for her to drive up from Dartmouth, which is where she’s living right now.”
Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms runs at the Owens until mid-May.
The Sweetest Little Thing
In February, the Owens shifts from exhibition opening to community fundraiser mode with The Sweetest Little Thing, a long-running Valentine’s Day event co-hosted with Struts Gallery.
“The Sweetest Little Thing, our annual fundraiser with Struts, is happening on the 14th and the artworks in the auction will be on display the week before.” Falvey said.
The event includes an art auction, a best-dressed competition, karaoke, and, as always, Rice Krispy squares.
Beyond the festivities, Falvey said the fundraiser stands out because it represents a rare, long-running collaboration between two arts organizations.
“That is not common. I don’t know any other place where that happens. So to my mind, it’s a really brilliant example of the great arts community that Sackville has.”
Falvey said the partnership has roots stretching back nearly 30 years, with proceeds split evenly between the Owens and Struts to support programming at both galleries.
“It’s a partnership that’s been going on for almost 30 years, definitely over 20. All the proceeds from the fundraiser are split 50-50 between the organizations and goes to programming at both Struts and the Owens.”
Looking ahead, the coming year is about maintaining momentum while settling back into a sustainable pace, balancing major exhibitions with community-focused programming.
With Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms opening this week and the annual fundraiser close behind, Falvey said the Owens is entering 2026 grounded in both its history and its role as a shared cultural space in Sackville.
Event details
- Exhibition opening: Dawn MacNutt: Timeless Forms – Friday, Jan. 16 at 7 pm, Owens Art Gallery
- Runs until: mid-May
- Fundraiser: The Sweetest Little Thing – Saturday, Feb. 14 (auction works on display the week prior), Owens Art Gallery
Clinton Davis is a community journalist and audio producer covering the people, events, and ideas shaping the Tantramar region.
