On Center Gallery (352 Commercial St.)
Katie Faria from Middleborough looks thoughtfully at Lorraine DeProspo’s Kiss the Day. Mounted on the wall at On Center Gallery between two other paintings by the same artist, Kiss the Day is Faria’s favorite.
“You get glimpses of sunlight coming through,” she says, “but you still have a storm. You’re not sure what’s going to happen — if it’s going to be a great day or a stormy day.”
In the piece, sunlight glints off seawater. Halfway up the canvas, a band of blue-gray clouds hangs, ominous. But the water is calm, and the storm clouds feel strangely gentle.
“I love the colors,” says Faria. “I tend to gravitate toward pieces like this.” This painting makes her feel like she’s sitting on the beach or in a marsh. That feeling, she says, is one of “calm and ease.”
Greg Salvatori Gallery (366 Commercial St.)
Alejandro Maldonado is in town from Boston with friends. At the Greg Salvatori Gallery, in a small room on the second floor, he’s struck by Richard Taddei’s Portrait of Thomas. “It looks really sad but also kind of hopeful,” he says. “He’s looking at someone he truly cares for.”
The piece is colorful and geometric, an abstract cityscape and a landscape, and a portrait in which the subject’s eyes are the focus.
“It’s beautiful,” says Maldonado. “I feel like you could make up so many different stories to go with it.”
Four Eleven Gallery (411 Commercial St.)
Peter Rivard now lives in Maine, but he used to live in Provincetown. “Provincetown is such a special place,” he says. “The light here is unique, like nowhere else I’ve ever been.”
He’s looking at two pieces by Liz Carney: Moors Tide Coming In and High Head View. In both, a distinct quality of sweet softness emanates from the land and sky.
“To be able to capture the light, and for people to take that home to wherever they live, is such a beautiful thing,” says Rivard. “To come to a gallery and take home a piece of the energy of the town.”
Rivard comes back to Provincetown whenever he can. “I’ve learned in life,” he says, “that we have to be rooted somewhere, and then we can visit places that we love.”
“It’s like no time has passed,” he says of visiting town, even though he acknowledges many of the businesses and people have changed. “No matter how old you get, this place still feels the same.”
Ray Wiggs Gallery (432 Commercial St.)
John Pittman is visiting from Washington D.C. and has stopped at Ray Wiggs Gallery on his way down Commercial Street. Long Shadows I, II, and III by Rick Legge caught his attention immediately when he entered.
Each of the three vertical sections show people walking — alone, in pairs, or in groups — on smooth gray ground. Their long shadows stretch out behind and before them.
This piece, which depicts people who Pittman guesses must be strangers to one another, is an unusual favorite for him. He usually prefers seascapes. But looking at Long Shadows I, II, and III, with their scenes of friendship and parallel community, he says, two words come to mind: “happiness and relaxation.”
The art is timeless, he says. “Eventually it will be dated, I guess, because of their fashion. But shadows are forever.”
Gallery 444 (444 Commercial St.)
Darren Jones is an artist based in Chicago. His series, called “One Can Dream,” is currently showing at Gallery 444.
“It’s a collection I’ve been doing for about 10 years,” says Jones. “It was originally inspired by an old telephone pole I saw in Mykonos. It was something I walked by 100 times and never noticed.” One night, he finally did: “It was covered in a million staples, dripping with paint and paper and fabric.”
To create his panels, Jones first layers several different textural elements. “I use layers of beach sand from my family cottage in Ontario, industrial staples, and plaster.” He paints with his hands. “For a typical piece in this series,” he says, “30 to 50 layers of color go on before it’s finished.” Before applying color, he makes lines of texture from his studio bills: “Electric bills, gas. I put them in the shredder and then put them to good use. It’s kind of funny — everyone’s gone paperless. And I’m like, ‘No, I still want my paper bills, please.’ ”
Showing his work in Provincetown gives Jones the chance to watch many different people react to his art — something he loves to do. “I love when someone has a physical reaction,” he says. He’s had people laugh and cry. Because his work is abstract, it’s fun for him to hear people discuss what they see.
“Someone will see something completely different than what I meant it to be,” he says.
