The Stewart Hall Art Gallery is dedicated to presenting professional-caliber exhibitions in contemporary and current art through a program of varied and innovative exhibitions.

Waterproofing work is taking place at the Stewart Hall Cultural Centre from now until November 2026.

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In the Spot Light

Legend: Studio Rat, Something in Between, 2023. Photo: Clara Cousineau

L’art de perruquer / Parallel Play

July 4 to August 30, 2026
Vernissage: Sunday, July 5, 2 p.m.

L'art de perruquer / Parallel Play features sixteen artists and artist duos, divided between two venues, who use everyday materials, gestures, and references to play with artistic and institutional conventions.

This reflection on creation and exhibition spaces is the result of a collaboration between two curators and two institutions, each of which has a distinct history but is deeply rooted in its community: the Stewart Hall Art Gallery, housed in a former manor converted into a cultural centre, and the Musée d'art de Joliette, which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year.

The exhibition’s title is inspired by the concept of perruquage, developed by Michel de Certeau in his book L’Invention du quotidien (1980). The term refers to how labourers discreetly divert time, tools, and resources from their work to create freely, as an artist would do. It is a modest, often invisible creative gesture, but one that gently resists the established order and the prescribed usage of things.

Emulating this crafty ingenuity, the artists in L’art de perruquer / Parallel Play work from “inside.” They transform rules and constraints into opportunities by bringing the mundane into the heart of the museum and the gallery and, through skilful digressions, imbue it with poetry and wonder.

Familiar objects, found items, DIY projects, quirky perspectives – through these materials and means, what is private and ordinary invades the exhibition space, making the institutional context itself a creative medium.

Artists presented at the Stewart Hall Art Gallery: Zoe Ann Cardinal Cire, Patrick Cruz, Nicolas Fleming, Bernie Goulem, Jake Kimble, Marlon Kroll, Clara Lacasse, Mea Bissett & Selina Latour, Frédérique Ulman-Gagné & Jacinthe Loranger, Studio Rat, Émile Riopel, Jem Woolidge

Curators: Manel Benchabane and Ariane De Blois

Legend: Clara Lacasse, Plateaux, 2021

New Dawn

In Clara Lacasse’s series New Dawn, the artist takes a documentary, speculative, and poetic look at the Montréal Biodome’s recent renovation. Presented in parallel with the exhibition L’art de perruquer / Parallel Play, this project offers a behind-the-scenes look at this popular institution, uncovering what is normally hidden and what is being transformed through a perspective that is critical yet still imbued with the romanticism of building such a unique world.

Installed outside in Stewart Hall Park, New Dawn creates a dialogue between a natural habitat preservation area and the seasons that unfold there in real time. The photographs will remain on view through the summer, fall, winter and spring, inviting us to reflect on our relationship to the living world.

This project is presented by the Stewart Hall Art Gallery.

Artist: Clara Lacasse

Curators: Manel Benchabane and Ariane De Blois

Temporary outdoor exhibition in Stewart Hall Park

Juin 2026 – Juin 2027

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History

The Stewart Hall Art Gallery is located on the third floor of a beautiful home built by Charles MacLean in 1905. The building was acquired by the City of Pointe-Claire from May Beatrice Stewart for a symbolic $1 in 1954 and became the Stewart Hall Cultural Centre in 1959.

Vi Duncanson, who had been instrumental in founding the Centre, became its Administrative Director. She also got the ball rolling to open an art gallery in the Centre and was officially mandated to do so with help from Evan Turner, Director of the Montréal Museum of Fine Arts, Jean-Paul Morisset, Director of Extension Services at the National Gallery of Canada, Professor Winthrop Judkins of McGill University, and his wife, Helen Judkins. The Stewart Hall Art Gallery opened its doors to the public in 1963.

The MacLean residence was already an art gallery: well before the Gallery’s official opening, the attic space on the third floor was used to present exhibits.

Programming

Working mostly with contemporary art, the Art Gallery actively participates in developing Québec and Canadian modern art by both recognizing established artists and encouraging up-and-coming artists. Through its cultural mediation programs and educational activities (workshops, lectures, screenings and meetings), the Stewart Hall Art Gallery encourages the community to get involved and helps to make art accessible to everyone.

The Art Gallery hosts about 10 exhibitions every year, displaying the work of professional, local and international artists that explore a variety of themes, approaches and mediums.

For more information on Art Gallery programming, see the Cultural Notes or the e vent calendar.

Consult the program

Consult the Culture Note

File submission process for exhibition projects

To submit a proposal to the Stewart Hall Art Gallery, artists and curators must send their dossier during a call for submissions. The Gallery only accepts submissions during an open call for submissions.

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