Next gathering · Provincetown
A conversation with artists on sustaining creativity, courage, and connection in difficult times.
September’s conversation
Sandy Longley · Dinah Mellin · Fred Boak
Three artists, one generous room, and an honest conversation about continuing the work. Everyone is welcome—bring your questions or simply your curiosity.
An open invitation
“I felt that we as creatives needed to have some conversations about it. To support each other. To find ways to carry on.”
Making Light brings visual artists, musicians, writers, poets, and performers into one room to support their own practices—and the creative life of the whole community. There is no stage to impress and no prerequisite to belong. Everyone is welcome to participate.
September 22 · This month’s guests
Each gathering crosses disciplines. What matters is not how we make, but how we keep making—and how we help one another continue.
Sandy Longley is a former English professor from New York State, now a full-time Provincetown resident. Finishing Line Press published Navigating the Waters, her first poetry collection, and Passager Press published her second, Mothernest, in 2023. Her work can be found in many literary journals.
Classically trained on violin, Dinah has played with the Cape Cod Fiddlers and various other bands over the decades. She is the founder of Allegretto Outreach, hosts Brick Hill House Concerts, and is a host of The Fiddle and the Harp on WOMR.
Fred sings with the Chandler Travis Philharmonic and the Three-O, often performing in pajama pants with a red plastic vuvuzela horn. He has been a DJ for two shows on WOMR since 2015: Omnipop Omnibus and Out There.
Save the dates
Between gatherings
An evolving library for creative courage, community, and the work of staying awake to the world. Follow a thread, open a shelf, keep what helps.
Because the point has never been the objects we’re making, or even the genuinely interesting and at times truly beautiful art that has at times emerged in those objects. The point has been what’s emerging in us—which hopefully includes this deeper way of perceiving the world and the ways in which we can offer ourselves to the world as agents of discovery and change.
Jeannine Ouilette
Words to carry
A monthly newsletter with useful articles, short stories, writing tips, book reviews, practical takeaways, and occasional surprises.
Protect the borders of your attentionGurdeep PandherCompassion needs boundaries so that we can preserve the strength to return to the fire.
A call to make joy a healer, a compass, and a quiet revolution against despair.
A reminder that difficult times call for language, imagination, and the work of repair.
A thought on why the desire to remake the world is bound to the creative impulse.
A reflection on writing as shelter, witness, and a light against swallowing darkness.
The archive
A growing directory of the artists, questions, and practices that have passed through the room.
From the archive
A changing selection from the artists who have joined us. Choose a portrait to meet someone new.
August 18, 2026
Ed is a painter whose work focuses on coastal landscapes, seascapes, and florals shaped by the light and atmosphere of Cape Cod.
View this conversationThe archive is growing; revisit these conversations whenever you need a little light.
Meet the organizer
A storyteller making space for artists to stay connected to their courage—and to one another.
Jeannette is a bestselling author of historical and mystery fiction, a poet, arts radio host, and Provincetown resident. She created Making Light from a simple conviction: when times are difficult, creative people need a room where they can speak honestly, listen generously, and keep going together.
Visit Jeannette’s websiteCome into the room
Tell us a little about yourself, ask a question, or let us know you’d like to attend.
