July 2007 Event & Exhibit Highlights


P'town Art Assoc. & Museum
presents
Edwin Dickinson

7/20 - 9/23
Opening Reception, July 20, 8 - 10 PM

 
An Anniversary, 1920-21

self portrait, 1914


The Provincetown Art Association and Museum is pleased to present Edwin Dickinson: The Provincetown Years, 1912-1937 which will consist of paintings and drawings done during the 25 years that the American modernist painter Edwin Dickinson (1891-1978) resided and worked in Provincetown, Massachusetts (1912-1938), a small fishing village located on the tip of Cape Cod. The show will differ from other exhibitions in concentrating on little-seen works from private collections shown within the context of some of his better-known pieces. Also on display will be rare prints done of Provincetown locales. Dickinson was honored with three earlier single-artists shows at the Provincetown Art Association (of which he was a founding member) held in 1948 and 1967 with a retrospective in 1976. This will be the first exhibition devoted to Dickinson to be held at PAAM since the artist's death in 1978. The show is to be a more personal tribute to the artist than would be possible elsewhere. Artists and friends who knew him are to share their reminiscences in a public program. Contemporary audiences will have a rare opportunity to examine the life and career of an artist within the context of the town that was so central to his art and life.


still life with guitar, 1914

It can be stated unequivocally that Provincetown was fundamental to the life and work of Edwin Dickinson. It was in Provincetown that Dickinson produced most of his most famous, large compositions. Of the eight large-scale paintings that cemented his reputation in the annals of 20th-century American art history, seven were painted in Provincetown. The artist's smaller premier coup (done in one session) landscapes and drawings also matured during his Provincetown years. Out of an oeuvre of approximately 1200 paintings and works on paper, Dickinson produced almost one-third of them in Provincetown. He first came to the small town in 1912 to study with Charles W. Hawthorne, whom he professed was his most influential teacher, at the Cape Cod School of Art. With some brief periods residing in other places, such as the 10 months of the artist and his family spent in France in 1938, Dickinson lived, painted, married and had a family in Provincetown. In 1939, the family moved 20 miles "up Cape" to Wellfleet where he purchased a home. Throughout his painting career, Dickinson drew subject matter from the life around and within him. Interior scenes of his studio and home, beach and harbor scenes, vistas of Provincetown streets, portraits of friends, family members, and other Provincetown folk were depicted in his works.
 
 

Provincetown is one of the major centers for the development of modernism in this country. Edwin Dickinson was a friend and colleague of many of the other well-known artists who helped establish Provincetown's reputation as an artistic haven in early years of the 20th century. He was also acquainted with and his work admired by many younger vanguard artists including members of the New York School of Abstract Expressionists, whom he knew from Provincetown and New York circles.

Luckily for art history, Dickinson left daily journals documenting his painting life as well as over 400 letters to his friends and patrons Esther and Ansley Sawyer (both available through the Archives of American Art). The Dickinson Family Archives also contains valuable vintage photographs documenting the people and places important to the painter during his Provincetown years. These sources are invaluable for shedding light on the very rich years that Dickinson spent in the small town.

As one of his students commented, "Dickinson didn't think independently of his life and what happened on the canvas or the drawing paper; they were exactly, identically the same thing." Audiences will have the unique opportunity to examine the life and career of an artist within the context of this town that was central to his life. This exhibition, primarily comprised of portraits and rare prints of Provincetown locales, will include works from PAAM's permanent collection and artworks borrowed from several esteemed institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, as well as the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, DC and the deYoung Museum in San Francisco.

The Provincetown Art Association and Museum was established in 1914 by a group of artists and townspeople to build a permanent collection of works by artists of the Outer Cape, and to exhibit art that would allow for unification within the community. Through a comprehensive schedule of exhibitions of local and national significance and educational outreach, the Provincetown Art Association and Museum provides the public access to art, artists, and the creative process.

The Provincetown Art Association and Museum
460 Commercial Street
open Monday-Thursday, 11-8PM,
Friday, 11-10PM
Saturdays and Sundays, 11-5PM.
$5 admission for non-members.
For more information, please call 508.487.1750
or visit www.paam.org
or email cmccarthy@paam.org


 
 
JULY HIGHLIGHTS
Ernden Fine Art Gallery
Hudson D. Walker / FAWC
P'town Art Assoc. & Museum

GALLERY/ MUSEUM EXHIBITS
Cape Cod Museum of Art
Castle Hill Gallery
Charles-Baltivik Gallery
Egeli Gallery
Ernden Fine Art Gallery
Hudson D. Walker / FAWC
Kobalt Gallery
Pilgrim Monument / Museum
P'town Art Assoc. & Museum
Rice/Polak Gallery
Simie Maryles Gallery
Tao Water Arts Gallery
William-Scott Gallery

ARTS WORKSHOPS
Museum School at PAAM
Truro Center for the Arts/Castle Hill

MUSEUMS
Cape Cod Musuem of Art
Highland House Museum
Pilgrim Monument / Museum
P'town Art Assoc. & Museum

THEATRE EVENTS
New Provincetown Players
Payomet Performing Arts Center
Shakespeare on the Cape
Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theatre

SPECIAL EVENTS

SHOPS & SERVICES
Allerton Framing
Chamber of Commerce
Farland Provisions
I Used To Be A Tree
id
Mercedes Cab
Roots
Under Glass
Utilities
James Zimmerman

P'TOWN TOURISM BOARD
Calendar of Events

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