Where the art is

Exploring P-town's resurgent gallery and theater scene

by Michael Joseph Gross

Ripped abs and cut pecs may be the most admired works of art in Provincetown these days, but it hasn't always been so. Once upon a time Eugene O'Neill wrote some of his best plays here, Hans Hofmann schooled Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko in abstract-modernist painting, and the Chrysler Museum brought Egyptian sarcophagi and Andy Warhol's soup cans to the Cape.

Today it's easy to go to P-town and skip the art scene altogether, except perhaps for a derisive chuckle at the sad-eyed clowns in the gift-shop windows on Commercial Street. Yet the 1990s have seen a quiet resurgence of high-quality galleries, a burgeoning literary community, and some bright prospects for theater in Provincetown. Much of the momentum in the art scene is coming from people whose entrepreneurial instincts are at least as strong as their aesthetic sensibilities. But in a town where summer rents run as high as $500 a week for a studio apartment, an artist's gotta do what an artist's gotta do.

Sometimes, what an artist's gotta do is take a fellowship. The Fine Arts Work Center lures emerging writers and artists to Provincetown by offering temporary immunity from market pressures, in the form of stipends, studios, and a free place to live for seven months in the winter. There are 1000 applications annually for the center's 20 fellowships; past winners have included Louise Glück, Denis Johnson, and Elizabeth McCracken.

If you're not among the chosen, you can still visit the center's Hudson D. Walker Gallery (a funky raw space in a former lumberyard on Pearl Street) or attend one of its readings -- the highlight in August will be a benefit featuring Robert Pinsky on the 16th. Or, with some extra cash and a free weekend, you can attend a fiction or painting workshop taught by the likes of Rick Moody or Michael Mazur ($225 for two days, accommodations not included).

Although the Fine Arts Work Center's primary mission is to launch emerging artists, it also aims to be one of the most business-savvy art nonprofits in the country. In May, the center hired a corporate litigator named Hunter O'Hanian as its new executive director, in order to stabilize the financial health of the place and deepen its connections to business and civic groups on the Cape.

The gallery scene is equally enlivened by entrepreneurship: a number of prominent artists own and manage the spaces that show their work. In addition to the old guard (such as the Anne Packard Gallery, which shows her quiet Cape landscapes), there are several newer artist-owned galleries worth checking out. Best is the Albert Merola Gallery, co-owned by artist James Balla, whose abstract paintings in asphaltum (the ground used to make etchings) crackle with patterns that alternately resemble tree bark, skin cells, and sun splotches at the bottom of a swimming pool. Also worth a look is the Fowler Gallery, which features Ron Fowler's landscapes and male erotica (Fowler illustrated The New Joy of Gay Sex).

Other galleries worth more than a gander include that of the Provincetown Art Association, whose Emerging Talent show runs through August 18. (Be sure to see Michael Carroll's paintings -- full of intentional pentimento, with houses and landscapes asserting themselves through the characters that fill them.) The Berta Walker Gallery is a great place to learn the history of Provincetown art, as are the Long Point Gallery (with big names like Robert Motherwell and Paul Bowen) and the William-Scott Gallery (whose end-of-season show features the dean of Provincetown artists, John Dowd). DNA Gallery is probably the best place for edgier new stuff, in a huge space that also hosts a strong line-up of readings and performances.

There's no concerted effort by the galleries in Provincetown to promote themselves as a group, which makes it a little difficult to find your way around. Stop by the Chamber of Commerce for a copy of its gallery guide, which is a good start but not comprehensive.

Culture vultures can take their evening sustenance at the Provincetown Repertory Theatre, the little engine that could of the P-town art world. Its director, Ken Hoyt, bears a resemblance to the young Mickey Rooney that's both physical and spiritual: as he waited tables after moving to Provincetown five years ago, he told everyone who would listen that he wanted to build a repertory theater.

Hoyt quickly learned he had to get good at fundraising before he could put on a show; he's now spearheading a $2.5 million fundraising effort to build a 293-seat theater. Groundbreaking is next summer, but the Rep is already in its third season, in a gallery space at the Provincetown Museum near Pilgrim Monument. The most promising show on this year's program is a new production of The Children's Hour by Lillian Hellman (August 29 through September 14), directed by José Quintero, who founded New York's Circle in the Square.

Subscriptions to the Rep aren't as strong as Hoyt would like, but he's confident that if he builds this theater, audiences (and money) will come. He believes Provincetown is a great place for actors because it "represents the whole range of human experience." His faith in the town is shared by Hatty Walker Fitts, president of the Fine Arts Work Center, whose patronage of the arts is explicitly aimed at strengthening the local economy. "Here you're not expected to fit into any little box," she says. "You're expected to get your juices flowing -- in all manners. That is what attracts artists to Provincetown. That's also what attracts gay people -- the freedom to just be."

Michael Joseph Gross is a freelance writer based in Boston.

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