This summer is a time to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Surrey Art Gallery (SAG), officially opened by then-mayor Bill Vander Zalm with a ribbon-cutting Sept. 15, 1975, at a new home in the city for contemporary art by local, national and international artists.
Ever since, the acclaimed gallery at Bear Creek Park has showcased a wide range of mediums and subjects including main-hall exhibits that change every three months. Admission and parking is free, making the gallery accessible to all inside Surrey Arts Centre.
A collecting institution, SAG is "sharing narratives through artworks in our care this summer," director Alison Rajah writes in a glossy guide full of events.
"Through an ongoing annual acquisitions donation from Surrey Art Gallery Association, the gallery holds in trust almost 2,000 works for future generations, including 70 cultural properties, which are recognized as national treasures."
The reality is, Surrey Art Gallery has run out of space to safely store all that art, one reason why the gallery might be on the move to a site in Surrey City Centre as part of a new Interactive Art Museum project, first pitched in 2017 for land near city hall. If and when the IAM is build, the current Surrey Art Gallery space at Bear Creek Park would be used for other purposes.
On June 11, Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke said "we have assigned money to that (interactive art museum) and will be moving on that one. We should have shovels in the ground there within the next year or so."
With many of Surrey Art Gallery's events "at full capacity with wait-lists and standing room," Rajah says, "we are eager to better serve where we are situated with the new capital project."
Back in 1975 Surrey Centennial Art Centre, as it was known then, was already seven years old when the gallery opened in a 3,000-square-foot corner of the building with two display areas, outdoor courtyard, ceramic studio, print and other workshops. "The opening of this gallery is a coming of age for Surrey," Vander Zalm raved.
Surrey Art Gallery has been called a "hidden gem" in the park.
"I don't know if it's hidden, maybe it's hidden to some," said Jordan Strom, curator of SAG exhibitions and collections. "I think getting the word out to people and marketing is something we're always trying do be better at. I think it's certainly a treasure, but of course I'm involved in it, I'm biased. But even before I became involved directly with the gallery (15 years ago), it had a great reputation.
"Over the years, working in different parts of the province, I do think it is a very special place, and when people find it, whether they stumble across it or they learn about it through whatever means, I think they're really quite taken with it and hopefully become regular attendees and audience members."
This summer, until Aug. 9, a 50th-annivesary group exhibit called 10 and 10: Story of Stories tells stories of the collection’s beginning and current moment. The art show "creates conversations" between works acquired by SAG from the first 10 years of collecting (1975 to 1985) and those acquired from the last 10 (2014 to 2024). These pairings aim to "highlight stories that emerge between them and to present narratives of Surrey’s social histories through themes of landscape, architecture, portraiture, and movement," SAG promo says.
A 6 p.m. party Saturday, July 5 will also celebrate the opening of Experiments in Solitude, showcasing analog photography, videography and cyanotypes by Brittney Appleby and MV Williams. Planned July 12 is a Family Art Party, noon to 4 p.m., and July 24 is when assistant curator Jas Lally will lead a 10 and 10: Story of Stories exhibit tour.
Such art-focused events thrill Lorna Farrell-Ward, a founding director of Surrey Art Gallery, who still visits when she can.
"The job was one of development, I would say. My job was to build it up as well as I could and also get some grants," Farrell-Ward told the Now-Leader in a phone call.
"Surrey was different at the time," she added, "with its support for developing funding to help it grow as a Canadian gallery, and further funding when it was shown that there was good community support, and an asset for new business arrivals.… Surrey Art Gallery continues to be a well respected gallery of 50 years. and hopefully will continue to grow with Surrey."
Strom says SAG has developed some exciting programming over a two-year period — some already rolled out, some upcoming. This fall, Kinesthesia is a group show of visual artists who integrate dance into their practices, he noted.
"In 2026 we have some really extraordinary exhibitions including In the Shadow of the Pavilions: Contemporary Art in the Time of Expo 86, an exhibition of art circa 1986, including many works from and about Expo 86, and a large solo show by the celebrated artist Keerat Kaur that is being curated by the gallery’s associate curator, Suvi Bains."
Looking back, Strom says he's impressed by some incredible art shows at Surrey Art Gallery over the past 50 years.
"Back in the day, Lorna and her team created an incredible balance between international, national and local artists, and we try to continue in that spirit," Strom said. "I think the gallery has done that over the years. Another important aspect is that the gallery tries to listen to artists, to be led by artists and what they're doing. Because of that, we were ahead in many things back in the 1980s and '90s. Before our more focused interest in digital art and electronic art, we were leaders in installation art and new photographic practices in the 1980s, what painters were doing.
"We've tried to tell the story of contemporary art from the mid-1970s when we were founded, but we try to also bring in historical work to help to tell that story of the last 50 years."
