Francesco Pio: We Are Not Alone

Images (left to right): Francesco Pio, The Old Ones (1 to 6), 2020-2022, mixed media on ½″ plywood, 20″ x 80″ each painting.

Francesco Pio: We Are Not Alone
Outdoor Art Installation

Thursday, July 10, 2025, 3 – 9pm
Wychwood Barns Park, Toronto
Free Admission | Fully Accessible

We Are Not Alone at Wychwood Barns Park is an immersive outdoor art installation that transforms public space into a sanctuary for stillness, memory, and connection.

Featuring 60 (20″ x 80″) free-standing mixed media paintings on wood, directionally placed in three concentric circles, the installation is inspired by a dream of standing alone in a desert, surrounded by ancient beings—The Old Ones. These paintings serve as vessels for ancestral memory and spiritual presence, inviting visitors to engage deeply with the invisible layers of land and self.

In a world marked by uncertainty—remnants of COVID still echo through our lives, alongside rising US tariffs, economic instability, the threat of job loss, and the rapid integration of AI—anxiety about the future runs deep. We Are Not Alone offers a quiet counter-space—one that speaks not with answers, but with presence. It becomes a space where we can pause, breathe, and remember even in chaos, connection still exists. That we are, indeed not alone.

Francesco Pio self portait, The Garage, 2023, photograph.

About the Artist

Francesco Pio is an interdisciplinary artist and educator whose work explores the intersection of urban life, spirituality, and our relationship with Mother Earth. Through his immersive work, he invites collective reflection, deepens connections to the land, and centers the unseen layers of place, memory, and spirit.

Working with large-scale 20″ x 80″ paintings on plywood, Pio often arranges his work into sacred circles—evocative spatial forms that blend ancient symbolism with contemporary urban environments. These circles act as portals for contemplation, drawing viewers into a space that feels both timeless and rooted in the present.

His practice is grounded in a deep respect for Western, Eastern, and Indigenous knowledge, philosophies, and aesthetics—infused with social narratives and a commitment to the Earth’s wellbeing. By engaging ancestral voices and lived experiences, Pio’s work becomes a platform for shared narratives that honour both personal memory and collective history. His work also calls attention to the fragile relationship between human activity and the natural world, underscoring the urgent need for reciprocity with the land.

Pio’s recent work, We Are Not Alone, transforms public space into a contemplative sanctuary, engaging audiences in dialogue with ancestral presence, land-based memory, and the spiritual undercurrents of the city. His work consistently positions art as a vessel for healing, reconnection, and transformation.

Wychwood Barns Park
76 Wychwood Avenue
Toronto, ON M6G 2X7

Media Contact
Frank Pio
frank.pio@gmail.com
647-546-2347
Instagram @francescopioart

Accessibility:
The Installation is fully accessible. For more information contact frank.pio@gmail.com

Approved by:
The Arts in the Parks Program, a free city-wide initiative managed by Toronto Arts Foundation (TAF), in partnership with Toronto Arts Council (TAC), Parks and Recreation (P&R), and community partner Park People. Permit # R25669