Public Art

Art often asks us to make a special trip. We seek it out in museums, galleries, and exhibitions, places set aside for looking. This project begins with a different proposition: what happens when art quietly enters the spaces we already inhabit?

The Micro Galleries of the Soo grew from that question. I created the project to bring original artwork into everyday places throughout Sault Ste. Marie, inviting artists Keith Nadjiwon and Andrea Pinheiro to create micro galleries of their own. Together, the three galleries offer unexpected encounters with art across the city. This gallery, located at the Soo Mrkt, features artwork by me, Goldie Barzan, and my son, Aryo Barzan.

The setting is intentional. A market is a place of routine, conversation, and community. It’s where errands are run, and familiar faces are exchanged. By placing a gallery here, art becomes less of a destination and more of a discovery. It enters the rhythm of daily life, asking only for a moment of curiosity.

This gallery is also an exploration of perspective. As mother and son, Aryo and I share experiences while seeing the world in distinctly different ways. My paintings often reflect an interest in colour, atmosphere, and the emotional character of place. Aryo’s work approaches the world with openness and imagination, reminding us that observation is never fixed and that creativity belongs as naturally to childhood as it does to experience.

Like any well-considered exhibition, this gallery rewards close looking.

Beyond the paintings are miniature pottery pieces, sculptures, tiny gallery visitors, and carefully composed displays that echo the language of larger museums. These details are not decorative afterthoughts but part of the experience itself. They invite viewers to slow down, to notice relationships between objects, and to experience the gallery not simply as a container for art, but as an artwork in its own right.

The collection moves comfortably between subjects. Local landmarks sit alongside landscapes, still lifes, city scenes, abstract compositions, and paintings inspired by places we’ve visited. Rather than presenting a single narrative, the works reflect the varied ways artists respond to the world around them. Together, they suggest that inspiration is found as readily in the familiar as in the extraordinary.

Scale plays an important role here. Each work is small enough to encourage intimacy. Looking becomes an active process; viewers instinctively lean closer, discovering details that might otherwise go unnoticed. In a culture that often rewards speed, the gallery offers something increasingly rare: an invitation to linger.

Perhaps that is the larger purpose of this project. Not simply to place art in unexpected locations, but to remind us that careful looking is a way of moving through the world. A miniature gallery at a downtown market suggests that beauty and meaning are not confined to cultural institutions. They can be found in the places we pass every day, provided we are willing to stop and notice.

Before you leave, take one more look through the windows. You may find that the gallery has changed very little but that you are seeing it differently.

Thank you for visiting! If you’re exploring the Micro Galleries of the Soo, we also encourage you to visit Keith Nadjiwon’s gallery at Fort Creek and Andrea Pinheiro’s on Topsail Island.

Goldie Barzan & Aryo Barzan