Saturday night at PikNik and beats are spinning from a deejay’s turntables, blaring outside the bounds of the gallery’s backlot. A crowd in their taste-maker threads, eating from the retro the ArtCliff Diner truck, is gathered in small town Oak Bluffs to see cityscapes. The scene at PikNik’s Urban Show demonstrated the transience of the urban mindset, its ability to be transplanted even to a mostly rural Island.

It’s the second year for PikNik’s urban show. The roster of a dozen artists includes eight Vineyarders, gallery owner Michael Hunter is proud to say: Traeger diPietro, Paul Norwood, Ellen Liman, Sherry Blalock, Gregory Coutinho, Max Decker, Adam Thompson, Anne McGhee, Tom Stephens, Alison Light, Gaston Valin and Nicholas DiFonzo. The intention, Mr. Hunter says, is to allow these artists, many of whom show primarily landscapes, to explore new subjects.

Michael Hunter hangs the Urban Show “like in a salon,” he says. With a sense of humor, practicality and respect for the art of hanging art, he weaves outdoor and indoor elements. The palate of the art, canvas size, and other elements inform his placements. There’s the green of a tree on which he consistently hangs diPietro’s work, the cream background against which the primary colors of McGhee’s Fenway series pop, the reflective surface behind Light’s abstract cityscapes bursting with rich turquoise and tomatoes, the charcoal grey against which one of Thompson’s crisp New York scenes hangs, and the white which features Valin’s Matisse pastoral-inspired cityscapes.

The newly added annex section of the gallery displays work by Sherry Blalock. The playful works challenge viewers to see small snippets of city life. One shows a destroyed New York city poster board, with several layers of grimy, water-damaged paper and the familiar NYC subway font. Hung just above the subway piece is a popular piece: a glimpse of good luck charm animals in a Chinatown store window.

Only feet away is Blalock’s depiction of three wrapped plants in the light of a nearby street lamp. “Who would’ve thought that . . . would be the subject of such a hauntingly beautiful oil painting?” wonders Mr. Hunter.

Gregory Couhtino’s milky realist depictions of New York city display a palate rich in city grayness. Hunter praised Couhtino, a native Vineyarder, for his acute eye.

Outside, a massive diPietro piece is propped against the gallery building, a Tom Stephens abstract cityscape is placed on an easel, and Valin’s earthy cityscapes line the billboard.

In the middle of the gallery is a wrenching triptych by Nicholas DiFonzo, a tribute to musician Elliot Smith, who died in 2003 from a drug overdose. Mr. Hunter now displays the work on tracks, the three canvases supporting one another as a pyramid. “It was an eleventh hour decision on my part,” Hunter said, of his move to bring the piece out of his gallery’s storage.

Three standout small India ink etchings by Max Decker are actually billed as the 11th Hour Cityscapes, as they were completed with only hours to spare before the show was hung.

Mr. Hunter hopes to encourage the artist to do more of the ink etchings for Decker’s solo show, which opens August 29 and will wrap up the summer season at PikNik (PikNikMV.com).