OPG Sunday: Bountiful Botanicals

Inspired by the exhibition Natural curiosities, join us to create botanical artworks. Flora such as flowers, fruits, veggies, and plants will be represented in our artworks.

In the studio create your own abstract patterned papers with acrylic paint. We will then cut our papers into the shapes of plants, gluing together colourful collages that pop against a simple background.

In the lobby we are creating linework drawings in METAL. We will etch the shapes of leaves, flowers, veggies or fruits in the shiny aluminum. Then use sharpie markers to colour them in, leaving them with a reflective shimmer.

E. May Martin (Canadian, 1865 – 1957); Iceland Poppy; 1896; watercolour on paper; Donated by the Ontario Heritage Foundation, 1988, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Lande

About Natural Curiosities
Flowers and plants have long fascinated artists, serving as both subjects of study and sources of inspiration. They provide a way to refine skills in observation, form, colour, and light, while also embodying nature’s beauty and fragility. Drawing from the RMG’s permanent collection, this exhibition highlights a range of floral and botanical art. Some works offer precise studies that capture fine detail, while others take a more expressive approach to the natural world. Together, they encourage us to pause, look closely, and rediscover the quiet wonder found in nature.

Click here to learn more about this exhibition.

Suitable for ages 3+
Free admission, no registration required.

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery is a proud participant in Ontario Power Generation’s Power for Change Project, supporting the areas and people where OPG operates.

Teen Art Zone Winter 2026


Come hang out at the art gallery! These sessions offer a welcoming space for teens to express their individuality, share new ideas, and try out a variety of art materials in a low-pressure environment. With a new theme each month, they’ll discover new ways to unleash their creativity, whether it be through painting, sculpting, mixed media or something else.

Free
Ages 13-17
Registration required
Class dates and details below

January 29, 2026
6-7:30PM

Taking inspiration from The Neighbour’s Art Hive, we are creating graffiti fences.

Using acrylic paint, our sculptures will tap into our unique individual creativity, and the ideas of community development and social connection through art-making together.

About The Neighbour’s Art Hive
As a place to make, rest, and connect, the installation, The Neighbour’s Art Hive, supports creative community development, social connection, and personal wellbeing through art-making experiences.
Click here to learn more about this exhibition.

February 26, 2026
6-7:30PM

We will explore Scott Rogers: Mutualism (Fixed Assets), considering the use of repurposed automotive junk and scrap materials. Teens will then use found materials to create an assemblage tile artwork.

About Scott Rogers: Mutualism (Fixed Assets)
Mutualism (Fixed Assets) is a new temporary public artwork for the backyard at Robert McLaughlin Gallery. This ambitious new installation builds on Rogers’ interest in human- built infrastructures for the care and support of non-human beings. Taking the form of a site-responsive bird feeding station, the work is assembled from broken automobile parts scavenged from roads and highways. This reuse of discarded materials connects with the industrial history of Oshawa, while proposing possibilities of ecological renewal out of the wreckage.
Click here to learn more about this exhibition.

March 26, 2026
6-7:30PM

We will take a tour of our permanent collection exhibition Homage, which features a variety of artists and works. After taking note of the impasto textured pieces, we will create our own!

Impasto is a technique that artists use while painting, laying thick paint on the canvas and to keep the brush strokes and palette knife impressions visible even after drying.

About Homage
Drawing from The Robert McLaughlin Gallery’s Permanent Collection, this exhibition explores how artists pay homage—to individuals, pivotal events, and shared experiences. Within these gestures of tribute lie acts of resistance, care, and the reclaiming of stories. Whether evoking ancestral knowledge, responding to collective grief, or reimagining iconic images, the artists in this exhibition use memory as a tool for both reflection and transformation.
Click here to learn more about this exhibition.


FAQ

What is the space like?
You are encouraged to either come alone or with friends! Plug into your own music or listen to the chatter. Materials and refreshments are provided.

We tend to keep the lights dimmed but they are still on. We play music on a medium volume, however this can be turned off upon request. The noise level in the room is about medium.

For more details on accessibility, visit this link: https://rmg.on.ca/visit/accessibility-and-accommodations/

Where is it happening?
The studio on the lower level. The gallery is free to visit. Walk in through the front doors, turn right and go down the stairs, turn right again once you see the door to the studio. Or, take the elevator near our gift shop to level 1.

Do I need to know how to do art ahead of time? Do I need to be an artist?
No! The art activities are beginner friendly. We offer all the necessary materials and instruction to complete a project. We also value abstract art, ugly art, and silly art. Feel free to try new things.

How do I contact the organizer?
Email [email protected] or call (905) 576-3000 ext.108

Opening Celebration: Haley Uyeda and Natural Curiosities

Help us celebrate the opening of Haley Uyeda’s solo exhibition featuring new works from the artist’s residency at the gallery!

We’re also celebrating a recently opened exhibition of floral and botanical art from the RMG’s permanent collection. Check out Natural Curiosities on Level 3!

More details to come.

This event is free and open to everyone. If there are ways we can support your participation, please contact Hannah at [email protected].

Community Connections

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery and the Oshawa Camera Club is teaming up with Community Development Council Durham’s (CDCD) Community Connections program to highlight the experiences of newcomers and immigrants in Durham Region. For this project, the participants took photographs that capture their lives in their new community and consider their important role within it. The contributions are celebrated in this exhibition and will be added to the Thomas Bouckley Collection, upholding Bouckley’s vision to collect images that reflect the continued evolution of Oshawa.

English Conversation Circle at Whitby Library, 2020, photo credit: Maria Abogado

The CDCD is a not-for-profit organization that has focused on enhancing the quality of life for individuals, families and communities in Durham for more than 50 years.  CDCD’s Community Connections Program gives opportunities for new immigrants to Canada to practice English in conversation circles, learn about their community, meet new friends, and enjoy social events celebrating equity and inclusivity.

OPG Sunday: Artsy Abstracts

This month we are exploring the abstract works in the exhibition, Hortense Gordon: Towards the New. Hortense Gordon, a Canadian painter, taught modern design and abstract principles for many years.

In the studio, we are creating geometric abstract works with acrylic paint and oil pastel. Our palettes will be monochromatic, mixing our paint colour with just black and white to make new tints and shades.

In The Lookout, we will create watercolour snowflakes as we admire the view of outside. Working with wet on dry painting techniques, paint an intricate, symmetrical snowflake that is one-of-a-kind!

Hortense Gordon (Canadian, 1887 -1961); Horizontals and Verticals; 1955; oil on canvas; Gift of Charlie Dobbie, 2000

About Hortense Gordon: Towards the New
Hortense Gordon (1886–1961) was a founding member of the influential artist collective, Painters Eleven, who were committed to advancing abstract art in Canada. Gordon valued the group’s shared energy and experimentation with abstraction. Buoyed by their support, Painters Eleven helped validate her move toward abstraction at a time when it was still controversial in Canada. Drawn from the RMG’s Permanent Collection, this exhibition highlights Hortense Gordon’s stylistic transformations and tireless pursuit of the new, celebrating her lasting impact on Canadian art.

Click here to learn more about this exhibition.

Suitable for ages 3+
Free admission, no registration required.

The Robert McLaughlin Gallery is a proud participant in Ontario Power Generation’s Power for Change Project, supporting the areas and people where OPG operates.

Natural Curiosities

Flowers and plants have long fascinated artists, serving as both subjects of study and sources of inspiration. They provide a way to refine skills in observation, form, colour, and light, while also embodying nature’s beauty and fragility. Drawing from the RMG’s permanent collection, this exhibition highlights a range of floral and botanical art. Some works offer precise studies that capture fine detail, while others take a more expressive approach to the natural world. Together, they encourage us to pause, look closely, and rediscover the quiet wonder found in nature.

In Conversation with Ekow Nimako

Join us for an exciting conversation between exhibiting artist Ekow Nimako and local writer, educator, and researcher, Ashley Marshall. Together, Ekow and Ashley will discuss how the exhibition Building Black Civilizations: Journey of 2,000 Ships re-imagines ancient African kingdoms through an Afrofuturist lens. Digging into histories of the African diaspora and envisioning abundant Black futures, this conversation will shed light on Ekow’s artistic practice and the inspiration and imagination that produced the exhibition.

This event is free and open to everyone. Seating will be provided for all guests.

Read more about the exhibition, Building Black Civilizations: Journey of 2,000 Ships, here.

For more information on our facilities, please click here. If you have questions about the event or other requests, please email Hannah at [email protected].

Ekow Nimako, Wawa Aba, The Sunrise Dancer (circa 1358), 2022. Courtesy of the artist.

Ekow Nimako is a Toronto-based, internationally exhibiting LEGO artist who crafts futuristic and whimsical sculptures from the iconic medium. Rooted in his childhood hobby and intrinsic creativity, Nimako’s formal arts education and background as a lifelong multidisciplinary artist inform his process and signature aesthetic. His fluid building style, coupled with the Afrofuturistic themes of his work, beautifully transcend the geometric medium to embody organic and fantastical silhouettes.

Ashley Marshall is a Durham-based writer, educator, and researcher. Their research critiques how power, economics, and politics influence social change, while advocating for imagination and creativity as alternatives to neoliberal market logics. Her work aims to use collaborative measures to dissect and render visible the various social and material flows that (re)produce hegemonic power structures and dismantle them. Marshall reviews art for Rungh Magazine, is a former Board member of The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, and is an advocate for the arts. With a penchant for Black surrealism, fabulism, the speculative, and foodie fiction, Marshall’s work is interested in what we can learn from nature to think towards humane frameworks. 

Building Black Civilizations: Journey of 2,000 Ships is organized and circulated by Dunlop Art Gallery.

Holiday Tea at the RMG

Join Berry Hill Co. for Holiday Tea at the RMG!

For three days, Berry Hill Co. will be in Arthur’s hosting a delightful holiday event.

Reservations and any queries must be made directly through Berry Hill Co.

Holiday Tea

The Neighbour’s Art Hive

The Neighbour’s Art Hive is back for another year!

Join us at the Opening Celebration on Thursday, December 11, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm

The Neighbour’s Art Hive a temporary installation that transforms the gallery into an active studio space with help from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio.

As a place to make, rest, and connect, the installation supports creative community development, social connection, and personal wellbeing through art-making experiences. We invite all our neighbours to drop in any time during operating hours to make use of the free art materials! Participants are welcome to take their projects with them or hang them up for everyone to enjoy during the run of the exhibition.Every Friday from January 9 to February 13, 2026, volunteers from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio will be onsite to lead facilitated sessions from 12pm-3:30pm. This is your chance to make art in community with others. The sessions are free, open to all, and light refreshments are provided. Check out more details on our Event Calendar. Learn about how this program got started here.

The Neighbour’s Art Hive is supported by the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

The Neighbour’s Art Hive with the LivingRoom Community Art Studio

The Neighbour’s Project, installed at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery (February 2024).

Join us for artmaking and community connection in The Neighbour’s Art Hive!

Passionate and helpful volunteers from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio will be onsite to support your creative explorations and cultivate a warm and welcoming environment for all.

Sessions
🟆 Friday January 9, 2026, 12-3:30pm
🟆 Friday January 16, 2026, 12-3:30pm
🟆 Friday January 23, 2026, 12-3:30pm
🟆 Friday January 30, 2026, 12-3:30pm
🟆 Friday February 6, 2026, 12-3:30pm
🟆 Friday February 13, 2026, 12-3:30pm

What to expect:

  • These drop-in events are free.
  • You’re welcome to come and go as you please.
  • Coffee, tea, and light snacks will be served.
  • Everyone is welcome; no art experience required.
  • Participants are welcome to take their projects with them or hang them up for everyone to enjoy!

The Neighbour’s Project, installed at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery (February 2024).

The Neighbour’s Project, installed at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery (February 2024).

The RMG is located at 72 Queen Street, Civic Centre in Oshawa, across from the McLaughlin Branch of the Oshawa Public Libraries. The Neighbour’s Art Hive is in Gallery A, which is located on the lower level of the RMG. It is accessible by stairs or elevator. Between the elevator and Gallery A, you’ll pass our public washrooms. We have an accessible single-stall washroom as well as gender-inclusive multi-stall washrooms. Read more about our facilities here.

What is an art hive?

Art Hives are safe, accessible spaces that enable people of all ages to participate in free public relaxation. In an Art Hive, traditional hierarchies, processes, and ways of being can be deconstructed and re-imagined in playful, personal, and compassionate ways.

The Neighbour’s Art Hive is a temporary installation at the RMG that transforms the gallery into an active studio space with help from the LivingRoom Community Art Studio. Outside of these facilitated sessions, we also invite all our neighbours to drop in any time during operating hours to make use of the free art materials on their own time.

The Neighbour’s Project, installed at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery (February 2024).

In partnership with The LivingRoom Community Art Studio, The Neighbour’s Art Hive is generously supported by the Ontario Trillium Foundation.