Frying Pan Gallery
250 Commercial St.

Friends Heather MacBride of Mashpee and Debbie Ward of Sandwich are dressed up for a night on the town. Having just enjoyed oyster happy hour next door at the Pearl, they are now taking in the gallery offerings. MacBride is drawn to metal artist Steve Swain’s fish-themed assemblages.

“I love their movement and sparkle. Are they minnows?” she wonders. “And I love this,” she says, turning to Shareen Davis’s photo triptych Breaking Light. “It really draws you in. To me, it’s just a picture of solitude. Actually, it reminds me of Truro. I wonder if it is Truro?”

Meanwhile, Ward examines Ron Kusins’s oyster shell pendants. “I just love oysters,” said Ward. “These are pewter, but they really capture the look of the shell. They’re just so beautiful that I had to buy one.”

Editor’s note: Because of a reporting error, an earlier version of this article and photo caption, published in print on Sept. 9, reversed MacBride’s and Ward’s names. Also, MacBride’s name was misspelled.

AMZehnder Gallery
25 Bank St., No. 3

Walter Winwood of Brattleboro, Vt. is looking at the work of printmaker Laura Peturson. Winwood says he’s on a repeat visit to Wellfleet, where he enjoys the galleries. While he’s drawn to all of Peturson’s prints, he comments especially on her multi-block linocut print Looking for Letters.

“It’s the intricacy of the design that I like,” says Winwood. “There’s a story in there, but it’s unknown. It’s slightly ominous, the forest. She looks afraid. And what letters is she looking for?”

BHA Gallery
42 Commercial St.

Susan and Wes Chapman of Truro are admiring painter Bob Henry’s recent work: oils of his apartment above the gallery as well as the views from his windows. Susan, an art teacher and artist herself, is drawn to Second Floor Wellfleet Triptych, Blue.

“What I love about it is its mundane subject that’s made so interesting by the shapes and colors,” she says. “Standing back, I almost see it as an abstract painting. And yet the images of the room are there, too. I like a reference point.”

Wellfleet Preservation Hall
335 Main St.

Rich Donovan of Boston is midway through his annual trip to Provincetown with three college friends. Today he’s decided to “get out of town for the afternoon.” Donovan is taking in Traci Harmon-Hay’s Floating Houses series, standing before the acrylic on canvas Hovering.

“I like architecture,” he says, “so I’m curious about these houses floating up over their foundations. I think they’re Wellfleet houses. They’re interesting.” Looking at Harmon-Hay’s watercolor Branch Out, Donovan’s friend Art Benning chimes in: “I like the floating chair, myself.”

The Cove Gallery
15 Commercial St.

Mark and Susan Williams are from Western Massachusetts. This is their first trip to the Cape since the pandemic. “I really find Wellfleet enchanting,” says Susan.

The pair are out looking for a piece of art to take home, “probably a landscape.” Mark says that he prefers realistic portrayals, while Susan prefers more abstract works. They are both drawn to the work of Larry Horowitz, particularly the oils on linen Lt. Island Bridge and Beach in Foggy Grey Haze. But they’re not ready to take one home yet.

“We haven’t decided,” says Mark.

Left Bank Gallery
25 Commercial St.

Jean Trindle of Dennis is spending an afternoon on her own in Wellfleet. “I was attracted by the nature paintings in the window. The seagulls, the horseshoe crabs. So, I decided to come in,” she says, looking at oil on panel paintings by Ellen Granter. Her eye was also caught by Thomas Marrinson’s bright lacquered bowls.

“They really seem electric somehow, as if they’re glowing,” she says. “I think they’re beautiful. Don’t you?”