On the desk where I spent most of my first winter in Provincetown were tokens that introduced me to this place but only obliquely: a wooden carving of a semi-erect […]
Arts & Minds
Celebrating the creative and sometimes quirky culture of the Outer Cape.
Browse all Arts & Minds stories below or dive into a topic:
POETRY
Outline
The merest touch of breeze or rain or passerby in early June sets pitch pines off in green-gold pollen spasms: old efficiencies of hazardous excess, their clouds stain everything they […]
POETRY
Long Nook
Poems of Truro resident Mary Maxwell’s five collections first appeared in Paris Review, Salmagundi, and Yale Review, among other publications. Submit poems to [email protected]. Include your full name, complete home […]
Arts Briefs
Arts Briefs for July 25, 2024 through August 1, 2024
A Cape-Wide Celebration of Chamber Music The 45th annual Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival, which takes place in several venues for two weeks this summer, begins on Tuesday, July 30 […]
NARRATIVE
Paintings Tell a Kaleidoscopic Civil War Story
In 48 panels, William Ciccariello creates a chilling, indelible novel
The poor thing, he’s seen so much. Death sprawls across the field, bodies lying next to one another like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. How do you walk through a […]
CABARET
The Art of Bitchcraft
Punk artist Bitch transports audiences to another planet
A line has formed outside the Post Office Café: some men, but mostly women, many middle-aged, their hair styled into mullets and pixie cuts, their faces framed by fringes and […]
THEATER
How Sondheim and Burnett Got Darren Criss to Provincetown
The songwriter and star of Glee makes his local debut in Broadway-centric concert
Provincetown hasn’t been compared to The Godfather or Star Wars very often, but those are the examples actor and singer Darren Criss names in acknowledging that his July 21 town hall appearance will be […]
RECONNECTION
An Exhibition Reunites a Family of Artists
Cove Gallery gathers the Shahns — Ben and his children Judith, Jonathan, and Abby
Though often overshadowed by her famous father, Ben Shahn, Judith Shahn, who died in 2009, was the star at Wellfleet’s Cove Gallery, which has promoted her artwork since she first […]
BOOKS
Three Friends From College, in Provincetown
A Novel Summer is the author’s fourth title set on Commercial Street
Summertime: the livin’ is easy, and maybe the reading should be, too. Dipping into Jamie Brenner’s new novel is like massaging your soles in the sand while anticipating that first […]
SAND AND ASPHALT
Arthur Nichols’s Panoramic Vision
Looking closely at nature, a photographer finds abstract minimalism
Eastham photographer Arthur Nichols was standing on a causeway at the edge of Onota Lake in Pittsfield during a wet snowstorm in late March 1972. He was looking at trees. […]
THE STROLL
Wellfleet, Saturday Night
Seen and heard on the weekly gallery walk
AMZehnder Gallery (25 Bank St. #3) At AMZehnder Gallery, Provincetown-based artist Pete Hocking, whose work is also currently hanging on the walls, takes a long moment to consider Patte Ormsby’s […]
Arts Briefs
Arts Briefs for July 18, 2024 through July 25, 2024
Chara Percussion Ensemble Explores ‘Uncharted’ Sounds The Chara Percussion Ensemble is aptly named. A Greek word meaning “finding joy despite circumstance,” chara is visible on the musicians’ faces whenever they […]
CROSSWORD #54
Independent Parts
PAINTING
Paul Kelly’s Cubist Constructions of a Town Gone Wild
The artist paints from his imagination, where elaborate patterns take hold
Provincetown artist Paul Kelly begins to work on a new painting by creating architectural graphite sketches. There is a certainty to Kelly’s sketches — a commitment to contrast and shape. […]
GIVE/TAKE
The Living Sounds of Ukraine
At Payomet, DakhaBrakha deals in shades of memory and persistence
There’s a game elementary students used to play, usually in P.E. class, stretched out on the grass or the polished wood of the gym floor. It involved a rainbow parachute, […]
