Cynthia Touchette “In The Space Between” July 4 – 25, 2026

Opening Reception with Cynthia Touchette & 25th Annual Sizzling Summer Soiree
Thursday, July 9 from 7-9pm

We are eagerly anticipating the first solo exhibition for Quebec painter Cynthia Touchette.  Born in the Eastern Townships of Quebec to a Haitian mother and a French-Canadian father, she has spent her life navigating a state of “in-between”.  Seeking to understand her own personal history, Touchette has turned to her family’s photographic archive ranging from vibrant tropical landscapes, architectural fragments and family portraits.  These images provide the foundation for the celebratory, vibrant and dreamy paintings included in our upcoming summer exhibition.

“Following profound losses within my family, my focus naturally turned toward the quiet spaces left by absence, moving my artistic practice toward themes of roots and transition.  Rather than viewing these losses as a definitive severance, I approach them as an invitation into a deeper conversation with my ancestry.  In seeking to understand the elements that continue to sustain me, I turned to my family’s photographic archive, discovering a mosaic of snapshots from Quebec and Haiti. 

These photographs from the past are deeply mysterious to me; they reveal a complex ecosystem of inherited and transplanted memories—vibrant tropical landscapes, architectural fragments, and unfamiliar relatives belonging to an imagined, constructed partial homeland.  Engaging with these images involves an active processing of memories that may or may not be my own.  This fluid boundary between personal recollection and ancestral myth completely alters how I occupy the present moment: it transforms the canvas into an immediate, living space where time collapses, allowing me to fully anchor myself in the here and now while dreaming backward.

This conceptual reconciliation of dual identities manifests through canvases that ultimately celebrate vitality and joy.  By injecting intense tropical hues—highly saturated magentas, fluorescent pink, warm peach tones, and radiant yellows—into the structural imagery of northern landscapes, my work radiates an inherent warmth and energy.  Bright, contrasting colour operates as a vessel for emotional resonance and celebration rather than literal imitation. Through this deliberate play with transparency and texture, I synthesize familial history, geographic spaces, and raw pigment into an assertion of presence. 

Ultimately, my practice is a testament that despite the ambiguities of memory and lineage, joy remains our most potent anchor; I belong completely to the landscapes I inhabit and actively choose to build my roots within them.”

Cynthia Touchette is a mixed‑heritage artist whose work examines liminal identity, ancestral inheritance, and the emotional landscapes of family memory.

Her new paintings included in “In the Space Between” transform photographs of her late parents — including images from Haiti, her mother’s birthplace — into contemplative paintings that explore the thresholds between loss, belonging, and becoming.

Cynthia Touchette received her BFA from the Université du Québec à Montréal and her Master’s degree from L’Université Laval.