Ewart always had an intense sense of identification with nature and its environment. It started when he was a boy. Varty Lake, canoe trips and the woods near Montreal were the nurturing grounds for his appreciation and awareness.

The wide open spaces of the prairies were also appealing. The romance of grain elevators, the wheats and skies, the subtle blending of earth tones with cloud formations and wind... was born, or planted, during two precious summer holidays of his youth when his aunt and uncle introduced him to life on their farm in Meota, Saskatchewan.

Or perhaps it was the fact that he himself was born in a Saskatchewan farmhouse kitchen on a windy April day in 1918.

From a 'Gallery of the Golden Key' exhibition brochure: ...'Peter Ewart has achieved wide recognition as a painter of the Canadian West. Mostly, he has been known for his subjects in which some aspects of man's relationship to nature was apparent. However, an intense appreciation of pure landscape painting is also very much a part of the artist's work and the present exhibition is the first one to be held in which his outstanding ability in this connection is shown to full advantage.

The group of winter subjects covers an aspect of nature to which Ewart has always brought great interpretive skill, and in these we are able to share his delight in the effects of winter sunlight filtering through the snow-laden woods, or casting its brilliant rays against the towering peaks of the Canadian Rockies. There are old Cariboo mile houses and other buildings softly shrouded by falling snow. These are painted with a keen discernment, and a mastery of subtle colour.' (Vancouver, 1972)