Susinn McFarlen in Burning Mom, 2025. | Photo by Moonrider Productions for the Arts Club Theatre Company.
Welcome to 2026! Here’s to a new year packed with joy, success and moments that actually make you stop and smile. As we turn the page on this fresh chapter, why not dive into what’s happening around town? Our region is buzzing with exciting events, from thought-provoking exhibits to show-stopping performances. So whether you’re a culture buff or just looking for a great night out, there’s something waiting for you.
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Lee Miller: A Photographer at Work
Now until Feb. 1
This Polygon exhibit explores one of the most intense and productive chapters in the professional life of American photographer Lee Miller. Between 1932 and 1945 Miller was a renowned portrait photographer running her own studio in New York (1932–1934), a photographer for perfume and cosmetic brands in advertising (1939–1945) and a fashion photographer and war correspondent for the British edition of Vogue (1939–1945). This short time span encompasses a rich history in which the photographer moved between and linked her various practices. The exhibit reveals the inner dynamics of managing a photography career amid the myriad challenges facing professional women at the time and offers a rich and complex portrait of this important figure, previously known best for her collaboration with American artist Man Ray and her close ties to the Surrealist movement of the 1920s.
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Strange Land
Now until Feb. 1
www.ferrybuildinggallery.ca/exhibitions/strange-land
The Ferry Building Gallery presents Strange Land, featuring paintings by Emma Fish, Jean Bradbury and Gregg Simpson that use the natural world as a mirror for human experience. In her vibrant mountain landscapes, Emma Fish explores the emotional connection between people and place. Jean Bradbury invites viewers into an imaginative world where native and invasive species become metaphors for belonging, displacement and coexistence. Working at the edge of abstraction and surrealism, Gregg Simpson embraces the fluidity and transformation inherent in nature. For more information, check out the gallery’s website.
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Burning Mom
Jan. 8–Feb. 8
www.artsclub.com/shows/on-tour/2025-2026/burning-mom
In this inspiring comedy, being performed at various locations in B.C., Dorothy realizes that life is too short to delay your aspirations. After losing her husband, she decides to take their RV on the road trip of his retirement dreams: she’s going to Burning Man. After all, it’s only a 21-hour drive to a weeklong culture festival and party with no plumbing in the middle of a desert – how hard can it be? Burning Mom is a stirring odyssey of self-discovery and tale of how art, everlasting roads and human connection propel her along the way. You’ll laugh and cry as Dorothy’s story, based on the playwright’s mother’s life, invites you to take risks and enjoy the small moments in life – come along for the ride! For showtimes, locations and tickets, check out the Arts Club website.
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The Structure of Smoke
Now until April 12
Through the lens of contemporary artists’ engagement with the metaphorical and literal processes of fire and the spaces it creates and displaces, The Structure of Smoke, on display at UBC’s Belkin Art Gallery, includes works that problematize the poetic, structural and political aspects of fire. These works complicate the inherent contradictions of wildness and domestication, technological progress and social control, colonial conditions, rebirth and death. Holding a smoked mirror to contemporary society, the works in this exhibition offer ways to undo the familiar in how we approach our uncertain future.
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remember the earth, remember the sky
Jan. 17–March 22, 10 a.m–5 p.m.
www.surrey.ca/arts-culture/surrey-art-gallery/exhibitions/remember-earth-remember-sky
remember the earth, remember the sky is a group show focusing on ancestral connections through land, air and memory as experienced and understood by early career artists connected to this territory and in conversation with works from the Surrey Art Gallery’s permanent collection by Salish artists. Using an array of mediums, including painting, digital art, sound, sculptural installation, ceramic and natural materials, the artists reflect on themes connected to place and environment, family history and ceremonies, migration and diasporic identities and spirituality. This exhibition also includes hands-on experiences with art, including a visitor invitation where one can contribute to an interactive sculpture, weekly piñata breaking referencing its history of celebration and ritual, a collaborative playlist where visitors can dedicate a song to their ancestors and more.
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Imagined Histories
Jan. 21, 5–6:20 p.m.
www.greencollege.ubc.ca/events/imagined-histories
Green College writer in residence Theresa Muñoz will be in conversation with novelist Madeleine Thien, discussing how to weave archives and research materials into poetry and fiction. Muñoz’s latest poetry collection Archivum explores objects belonging to writer Muriel Spark, actor Maggie Smith, the 19th century slave owner’s daughter Eliza Junor and psychotherapist Marie Battle Singer. Thien’s recent novel The Book of Records merges the lives of philosopher Hannah Arendt, poet Du Fu and scholar Baruch Spinoza into a narrative about father and daughter on a shore-lined migrant compound known as ‘the Sea’. Anchored by themes of migration, displacement and legacy, the authors will discuss the challenges and joys of archival research and how it shapes one’s creative practice.
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Pacific Agriculture Show
Jan. 22–24
The Pacific Agriculture Show will showcase the latest and most innovative equipment and technology for the agriculture industry. Join thousands of farmers and agri-food producers in comparing and investigating the latest and greatest from over 300 exhibitors. B.C.’s agriculture industry is unique in its diversity and the show attracts an attendance from all the livestock and horticulture sectors including: dairy, cattle, poultry, equine, hogs, llamas, alpacas to vegetable, berry, grape, bulb, ornamentals, hothouse, flower and shrub growing and more.
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Macbeth
Jan. 22–Feb. 8
Bard in the Valley will put on a production of Macbeth from Jan. 22–Feb. 8. Three witches tell the Scottish general Macbeth that he will be King of Scotland. Encouraged by his wife, Macbeth kills the king, becomes the new king and kills more people out of paranoia. Civil war erupts to overthrow Macbeth, resulting in more death. For tickets and showtimes, please check out the Bard in the Valley’s website.
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Sunset Meditation – Mindfulness Under the Stars
Jan. 23, 7–9 p.m.
Meditate under the stars in the Space Centre’s Planetarium with a soothing journey from the Grand Canyon to the North Pole. Step away from the noise of everyday life and reconnect with calm in a truly immersive setting. Meditate beneath the stars in the Planetarium, where the vastness of the universe meets the stillness of the mind – inviting reflection, balance and renewal. Presented in collaboration with the Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health, this wellness-focused evening combines a visually soothing planetarium experience with a meaningful conversation with David Greenshields on mindfulness and resilience.
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The Replacement Wife
Jan. 23–Feb. 15
The United Players of Vancouver, in association with Solo Collective, will put on a production of playwright Aaron Bushkowsky’s play, The Replacement Wife. After a dire medical prognosis, Jackie matches up her incompetent and “lost” professor husband Ben with Rachel, her super organized, now retired best friend, before heading off to Mexico for risky treatment. But, after six months of experimental drugs with another patient, Suzi, who defies expectations, Jackie returns only to find Ben a completely changed man – and not necessarily for the good. A comedy about friendships over time and how love changes. Check out the centre’s website for tickets and more information.
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The Chromophiliacs
Jan. 24–April 4
www.richmondartgallery.org/thechromophiliacs
This winter, Richmond Art Gallery will explode with colour with works by various artists in the exhibit The Chromophiliacs. Published at the beginning of the twenty-first century, British artist David Batchelor’s book Chromophobia (2000) critically examined what the author termed “chromophobia” – the fear of colour. Historically marginalized and othered within European and North American culture, colour continues, even today, to be linked to notions of impurity, primitivism and decadence. A dynamic response to his still timely thesis, the exhibit is an electrifying showcase of artists profoundly inspired by colour as well as a myriad of craft practices and cultural aesthetics.
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