For the first time in his 50 years of painting and exhibiting on Martha’s Vineyard, Allen Whiting has a show in Edgartown. Through Friday at the Old Sculpin Gallery on Dock street, six paintings by Mr. Whiting—including two of Edgartown scenes—take pride of place in the gallery’s center aisle.
“I was pleased to have the opportunity,” Mr. Whiting said by phone from his family farm in West Tisbury, where he has run his own gallery for the past half-century.
“This would have been my 50th opening this year,” added Mr. Whiting, who usually opens the summer season with a well-attended reception at his Davis House Gallery on State Road. This year, because of Covid-19, Mr. Whiting skipped the party and opened his gallery by appointment only.
“It turned out (to be) pretty good...” he said. “Enough people called that I can work and sleep this winter.”
The current show includes both large and smaller works from Mr. Whiting’s studio and the barn where he stores his paintings. One of the most striking, a sweeping view of Edgartown Great Pond, lived in his barn for close to a decade before emerging for this week’s engagement.
“When I first did it, I was disappointed,” Mr. Whiting recalled. “I put it away.”
It’s fortunate that he reassessed the painting, a serene yet immediate evocation of place, while preparing for the Old Sculpin show. Down-Island views are relatively rare for Mr. Whiting, a descendant of the Island’s earliest English settlers who regularly paints in his native West Tisbury and nearby Chilmark.
A more recent Edgartown scene, Pine Trees at Wasque, also hangs in the current show along with up-Island views including Sheep in Ground Fog and View from Flanders Lane-Chilmark, with a distant glimpse of Coast Guard Station Menemsha foregrounded by a timeless Vineyard boulder.
A particularly apt choice for Derby season, Jane L depicts a small bass boat heading past an Island shore under a golden dawn.
Fans of Mr. Whiting’s work also have the option to buy his coffee-table book, Allen Whiting: A Painter at Sixty, copies of which he donated to the Old Sculpin for sale during the show.
Mr. Whiting’s exhibition and a show of work by Ed Schulman both close Sept. 25. Mr. Schulman’s dynamic, semi-abstract paintings of people and places form a piquant contrast to Mr. Whiting’s landscapes.
The Old Sculpin also is showing smaller works by members of the Martha’s Vineyard Art Association, which operates the gallery. Hours this week are Tuesday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
For more information, visit oldsculpingallery.org. Mr. Whiting’s website is allenwhiting.com.
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