The Art Colony

Robert Motherwell in Provincetown with Lise Motherwell

The Artist and The Sail Loft with Elspeth Slayter

This week, we welcome artist Steven Wells, who grew up in Truro and describes the privilege and “magic” of Provincetown, its community, light, and energy. He discusses a supportive, tool-filled upbringing influenced by his father’s blacksmithing and biochar work, his siblings’ creative paths, and his own wide-ranging practice (woodworking, leatherworking, ceramics, metalwork) that feeds into painting. He recounts studying through 4Cs and PAAM programs, early street-art influences, and learning how to be an artist through mentors and framing work, leading to Pilgrim Framing (founded 2012). Wells explains running a working studio in the MacMillan Pier trap sheds, balancing art-making with constant tourist interaction, and developing his bright, vibrating Provincetown landscapes and night scenes. He also covers teaching oil-painting workshops at PAAM, traveling to Ireland with artists for Beltane-related festivals, and shares where to find his work and contact info (Instagram “Subjective Steve,” studioprovincetown.com).

This week, we interviewed playwright Joe Paprzycki about Eugene O’Neill’s life and formative Provincetown years. Paprzycki describes his own work and the Truro Playwright Collective’s free winter play readings at the Truro Public Library, then traces O’Neill from his 1888 birth, theater-filled childhood, Catholic schooling, and expulsion from Princeton to his seafaring years and arrival in Provincetown in 1916. With the Provincetown Players (Susan Glaspell, Jig Cook, Mary Heaton Vorse and others), O’Neill’s “Bound East for Cardiff” premiered at the Lewis Wharf fish house theater, gaining acclaim. O’Neill wrote prolifically, lived above the A-House, later had a Peaked Hill lifesaving-station home that fell to erosion, and left for California after marrying Carlotta in 1929. The conversation covers O’Neill’s sea influence, “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” family tragedies, the rediscovered “Exorcism,” and Paprzycki's play “Players on the Harbor.”

This week, we interviewed costume designer and performer Eric Auger, who describes growing up in rural Burrillville, Rhode Island in an artistic family, early homemade Halloween costumes, and formative painting lessons that fueled his imagination. After earning a BFA in photography/graphic design and working in visual merchandising, he was inspired by street performers in Montreal and began performing as living statues at Providence’s WaterFire, launching 1031 Productions (“We make pretend”), which provides living art and themed entertainment worldwide. Now a Provincetown resident, Auger performs on Commercial Street in elaborate characters (including Count Orlok, Beetlejuice, Count von Count, Borg, Penguin, White Walker, Krampus) and played Jacob Marley at the Provincetown Theater. He also DJs on WOMR with “The Reminiscence Bump,” discusses costume fabrication materials and process, and previews possible Halloween street performances.