_{Pete Hocking, The Dangers of Celebration & Loneliness, 36 x 36 inches, oil on panel.}

This show feels different. I’ve said to a couple friends that I intuitively know the time I need to prepare for a show, and this year was no different. But my making cycle was punctuated by a back injury and a broken nose, which cost me ten working days. The past two weeks have felt like a race, but the compression may have helped propel a few of the paintings to a better place than they might have otherwise landed. After installing the work last night I recognized that I really like the show, and I’ve made some distinct pieces. All good, even if I feel a bit exhausted.

While I can glean some benefit from last month’s chaos, I also understand that I’m pushing the edge of my capacity — and working in a way that doesn’t feel sustainable over the long haul. I was trained in an art school that valued ‘the all-nighter’ as a way to ‘push through.’ While I’ve consciously taught against these ideas, I also recognize how they’ve been impressed into my creative DNA. I have to wonder if it’s even possible to break this cycle.

Next week I’ll be teaching at Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, which will allow me an immersive studio experience — and perhaps give me some time to consider these questions of pace and labor. To be honest, though, I’m looking forward to getting back to work. 

My show opens today, with a reception this evening:

I’m In Love And Always Will Be: New Work by Pete Hocking opens on Friday, June 30th with an artist reception from 7 – 9  PM, The show runs through Thursday, July 13th. In addition to the show, Hocking’s paintings are available to view and purchase at fourelevengallery.com

Pete Hocking’s paintings over the past decade are an extended love letter to the Outer Cape. He fell in love with the landscape at 13-years old and returned three decades later to embark on a deep exploration of the place. His painting practice is rooted in a love for walking and immersion in the wilds of the National Seashore and our quirky townscapes. “Every time I think I’ve exhausted my exploration, I see something new and fall in love all over,” says Hocking. “Even places I know well continue to astound me because they reveal themselves differently in every season, in every visit.”

Pete Hocking is an interdisciplinary artist, activist, and teacher who lives and works on the Outer Cape. His artworks are concerned both spatial poetics and the one’s emotional connection to place. He’s interested in the ways that individual human identities are inscribed into human and non-human landscapes, and ultimately in the ways that the non-human world defies human intervention. Hocking is an independent painting instructor and offers summer workshops through the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. He is a founder of Provincetown Commons.