Peter Vincent

1947 - 2012

Peter Vincent was a man of the sea and his art reflects his passion for all things marine.

Vincent spent his childhood in Connecticut, moving with his family to Rockport as a young man. His early artistic skills were nurtured by his parents and after graduating from Rockport High School, he went on to study at the New England School of Art, the deCordova Museum School and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, from which he received a diploma. Here on Cape Ann, Vincent studied under several artists including Paul Scott, Don Stone and John Terelak. He often noted sculptor George Demetrios (who was a master at the art of figure drawing) as having had perhaps the strongest influence on his career.

Peter Vincent’s interest in the maritime world covered a broad spectrum. Beginning in the early 1970s, he spent hours immersed in the comings and goings of Gloucester’s working waterfront talking with people involved at Maritime Gloucester and on the schooners Truant and Adventure, absorbing all he could about shipboard life. He read Joe Garland’s books as well as Gordon Thomas’ on the history of fishing under sail.

Peter Vincent was a master draftsman and the drawings he created were the basis of later prints, illustrations and paintings. His preferred paint was acrylic, a medium he found best for controlling detail, allowing him to capture all the intricacies of a seine net teeming with fish, the rigging of a schooner or the weather-beaten faces of a group of fishermen.