Impossible to Duplicate

Being Square by Mike Wright
9.5″x6.5″x2″; found painted wood. Courtesy of the artist and Alden Gallery.

COLLAGE ON VIEW

Mike Wright & Paul Kelly

at Alden Gallery in Provincetown, Massachusetts, USA
17-30 July 2020

Mike Wright is a Provincetown artist who has for decades been creating sculpture made of painted wood she has found locally. This year she has created a series of small standing works that suggest figures. “The point of using found wood is that, as debris, it seems unpromising,” Wright says. “But that lack of promise is also its appeal—the peeling paint, the color scrubbed by salty waves, sand or human use. The main parameter is that the wood must be found in Provincetown. The second is not to paint that wood, because its patina is impossible to duplicate.” Wright has received a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, an Artist’s Residency Award at the Vermont Studio Center, and has had solo shows of her work at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum, Cape Cod Museum of Art, and St. Botolph Club in Boston.

Captain Jack’s Wharf #9 by Paul Kelly
18″x24″; oil on canvas. Courtesy of the artist and Alden Gallery

Provincetown artist Paul Kelly has been showing at the Alden Gallery since 2010. “My paintings have evolved over the years from townscapes, using a basic understanding of architectural forms from my professional background as an architect and city planner, to imaginary forms and locations using unidentified vantage points,” Kelly says. “I look for impossible perspectives on well-known images to trigger my curiosity and re-examine our built environment. My approach and preparation for creating oil paintings include my love for notebook pencil sketching, quick watercolor studies, and weekly access to figure drawing to keep my eye in check. The art of Hopper, Thibaud, Diebenkorn, and Nicholas De Stael are significant influences.

(text adapted from the gallery’s press materials)


INFORMATION

Alden Gallery
Suite 1
423 Commercial Street
Provincetown, Massachusetts 02657 USA
(508) 487-4230

Hours (through Labour Day):
Daily, noon-5PM

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