FLORA + FAUNA ENCHANTED FOREST
Group show with works by Amadeo Gjrra, Luanne Witkowski, Gin Stone, Justine Crosby, and Andrey Quintana
Opening Reception: Friday, August 22 from 5 - 7 PM
On Exhibit through August 31
The Commons
46 Bradford Street, Provincetown
In tandem with this year’s fashion show, Enchanted Forest is a group art exhibition that invites visitors deeper into the myth and mystery of Cape Cod’s Beech Forest. Installed in the heart of The Commons, the Community Room will be fully transformed into an immersive woodland environment—lush with organic textures, dappled light, and sculptural elements that echo the forest’s quiet magic. This enchanted space becomes both gallery and dreamscape, setting the stage for works in painting, sculpture, installation, and mixed media that reflect themes of metamorphosis, shadow, and nature’s resilience.
Each piece in the exhibition speaks to the fantastical energy of the fashion show, extending its narrative into a more contemplative realm. As with the runway, this show supports The Benji Fund—helping to sustain the creative lives of Cape-based artists. Enchanted Forest invites you to wander, to lose yourself, and to rediscover the power of art rooted in place, imagination, and community.
Untitled (light/dark), 2024
Acrylic on canvas
46 x 46 in
Andrey Quintana
QUINTANA USES A BULLET AS HIS BRUSH.
Andrey Quintana paints with intention of creating splendor and beauty in search of liberation from dark times. He uses an actual bullet— an object typically used to inflict pain— as his brush, in a magical transformative process. Quintana's paintings are large canvases of vibrantly colored flowers. His technique creates thick, lustrous, textured fields. The artist conveys the need for change while provoking the viewer to remember and rejoice in nature's beauty.
Amadeo Gjurra
Queerly Poletastic
Nightlife Fauna of Provincetown
Dive into Provincetown’s queer nightlife, where pole performers spin and soar under blacklight, turning movement into a vibrant act of erotic self-expression, queer power, and unapologetic artistry.
Queerly Poletastic is a video installation that reimagines Provincetown’s queer nightlife, transforming pole dancing into a powerful story of queer expression through an immersive gallery experience. It immerses viewers in the town’s vibrant queer ecosystem, where sculptural, meditative presentations meet energetic, immersive documentaries—revealing the many ways queer performance can move, inspire, and delight. In the sculptural work, static frames of dancers spin on a vertical monitor, with RGB lighting amplifying every silhouette and motion. Holographic fabrics scatter light across the gallery, reflecting the rainbow vibrancy of queer expression. UV lighting evokes the energy of nightlife, while UV-painted dollar bills highlight the often overlooked value of the performers’ artistry.
The immersive documentaries pull viewers into the choreography itself. Moving in real time with the dancers, the camera lets you feel the rhythm, momentum, and joy firsthand—like riding a “pole rollercoaster” alongside the performers. The line between audience and artist dissolves, inviting empathy, insight, and shared celebration.
Through these contrasts, the work celebrates resilience, creativity, and queer joy, reframing pole dancing as both a personal and cultural practice. It’s a journey through Provincetown’s living landscape, where nocturnal nightlife and daylight wonder coexist like fauna and flora in a magical enchanted forest.
Amadeo Gjurra is a queer immigrant filmmaker from Albania, who documents the vibrant nightlife of Provincetown, MA, where he currently lives. With a background in UX/UI design and theatrical/vocal performance, his work combines documentary film, entertainment, and activism. Amadeo’s interdisciplinary practice amplifies queer voices across media platforms, using films as catalysts for change. Recent projects focus on increasing the visibility of queer identities within the pole dancing industry and communities, aligning with his commitment to inclusivity and empowerment.
GIN STONE
I will inhale smoke and exhale butterflies
As an interdisciplinary artist, I work in fiber, painting, pen and ink, hand and machine sewing and mixed media constructions/installations that bear the weight of environmental activism and animal advocacy. I have also used photography to document the work of environmentalists. My current interest is focused on the concepts of the bardo experience occurring in the animal world, what animism means and what that means to the humans that cause death either directly or indirectly.
a remembrance
2019
cyanotype printed cotton duck, reclaimed nails, shed antlers and mixed media
80 x 10 x 14 in.
Head printed with frontal cyanotype of deer skull, sides printed with two jaw mandibles, body print of wildflowers and grasses. Nails from my late father’s workshop. Depicting the balance of life, death and what is left.
My materials have included salvaged ghost gear (a hazardous form of marine debris that endangers the oceanic environment from the surface tension at the top of tumultuous waves to the darkest pressures on the sea floor), recycled and antique textiles and furs (both being grotesque and beautiful in their own ways), and found/collected/border-line-hoarded objects.
By appreciating the fleeting beauty of what is, it imparts one with the angst and ennui of a knowledge of its faulty adaptability in a roiling sea of manmade change.
unnatural decay/ denim split gill mushroom
2024
recycled denim, dye, canvas, recycled fabric, waxed cotton thread, adhesive, ghost gear net
60 x 72 x 1 in.
meditation on climate grief. how do things decay when the material is not natural.
we will become the fodder for what comes next.
We’re outta here (Tiger Bardo)
2025
84”H x 108”W
acrylic on raw canvas, charcoal, conte crayon, sewn canvas and linen, thread, india ink
Luanne E Witkowski
Studio Visit with Luanne E Witkowski
Clarity
The daily routines of walking through forests, parks, and countryside of wildlife, flora and fauna followed by engagement with city streets, glass and artificial light interweave and inform as Witkowski creates and explores the interaction and juxtaposition of various materials. In doing so, she recalls the shared experiences grounded in each of us-- creating a perceptual and spiritual relationship for recognition of and solace for the self. This approach to the identification of the individual with landscape and environment is enlarged by a desire to discover and contact the particular indwelling essence or energy of clarity.
Aureolin, 33.5”x 17” mixed natural and fabricated materials, 2022
Royal, 18.5”x 12” mixed natural and fabricated materials, 2022
This body of work is a response to the world around and within us. The relationships are interwoven. Nature’s handiwork impresses and informs all matter –present and passed, permanent and ephemeral, physical and virtual. Layers of materials and recollection create perceptual and spiritual relationships that serve as a locus for grounding, recognition, and solace. In her March 2023 solo exhibit, Clarity, Witkowski reflects on shared isolation, the impacts of repetitious exposure, and salvation. She uses both found natural materials and fabricated cast-offs and scraps, focusing on composition, recurrent pattern, minimalist form, and color to create a response to the fragile systems of beauty and the power that exist in both the natural world and urban landscapes. All of this is accessible through the contemplative creative process of perception and felt by us when we allow ourselves to relax and use our five senses.
Peace Offering VIII, mixed fabricated and foraged materials on canvas, approx. 13” x 12”, 2025
Verdant, 36.5”x 30” mixed natural and fabricated materials, 2022
Passage, 32”x 9” mixed natural and fabricated materials, 2023
Justine Crosby
Art is the language that I use to contemplate the seen and the unseen.
With a lifelong interest in both drawing & dance, I studied illustration in Savannah at SCAD, then received my BFA in Boston at MassArt. I have also performed on various stages in different capacities around the country. As a visual artist and a performance artist, I have connections in both fine art, illustration, dance, costume, makeup, and hair. I’ve worked in paper, paper mâché, fabric, copper wire, ink, gouache, acrylic, and mixed-media. And through these mediums, I’ve experimented in both 2-D and 3-D works, and in small to larger scale installations.
My current obsession is lampshades. Specifically, bringing older lampshades a new life, in my favorite medium ~ paper. Handmade paper, vintage magazines, drawings, paintings, and sketches are all mixed together to form a one of a kind lampshade. Each shade tells a different story from every angle and the story continues to evolve depending on if the light is on or off. The possibilities feel endless.
@shadesofghey