Art & Artists

Shortly before dawn with darkness still blanketing the beach, Dale Sorensen, Jr. has already positioned his tripod and camera waiting for the sun’s early rays to cast a glow over sky and sea. The realtor with a passion for photography has done his homework

Paul Pickel, who runs the studio, is a second-generation stained-glass craftsman, but the techniques he uses date back more than a thousand years.

Let’s face it. Artists have a bad rap as being notoriously inept at business. “What?” you say, with touching innocence in your voice. “But it’s true. Just try to picture Van Gogh creating a business plan, cajoling a customer or reading a balance sheet!”

A silver anniversary is cause for celebration and that’s just what has been happening at the Vero Beach Museum of Art since the beginning of the year.

As one of the country’s best small “art towns,” Vero Beach is brimming with smart, creative and energetic people. Artsy types have been flocking here since the turn of the 20th century, though some didn’t fully blossom until after their arrival. Spending time in our quaint seaside municipality seems to feed the imagination as much as bigger and better known cultural meccas like New York City and Santa Fe

It’s a good thing Leslie McGuirk refused to believe it when people kept telling her she didn’t have a creative bone in her body. Something inside told her that one day she would prove them wrong. She did, and in a big way.

Vero Beach is home to many talented residents, and never is it more evident than at this time of year when the results are announced for the Indian River Photo Club’s annual juried competition.

“For me a strong work of art is the result of a powerful experience. I am attracted to everyday sensations and find myself responsive towards the subtle beauty of things, the hours when there is tranquility of light, the rhythms of nature,” says painter Luke Steadman.

In a brilliant blend of circles, dots and lines – straight, curved or quirky – Beatriz Milhazes’ favorite colors leap to life, forming the spirited patterns that captivate her viewers.

Throughout the world there still exist people who will hide their face from a camera, believing that when you take a photograph you capture a piece of the soul.

Few writers have had such an impact on the way knowledgeable Floridians view their state as Carl Hiaasen, whose wickedly funny takes on Florida’s foibles and follies have been the basis of eight best-selling novels, including Lucky You, Sick Puppy, Stormy Weather and Striptease.

It is hard to pin down what sparks that creative charge inside our brain.

AE “Bean” Backus, best-known for his Florida landscape paintings, was an exceptional artist who lived an unusually liberal lifestyle.

On a sunny afternoon, with rays of light shining through the windows, Virginia Knapp leans back on a sofa, crosses her long legs and smiles.

The Sporades Islands, which include the islands of Alonissos and Skopelo, lie east of the Greek mainland.

More that anywhere else, the Treasure Coast is the focus of paintings by the Highwaymen, that loose-knit group of black Fort Pierce artists who produced a cultural explosion unlike any other in our state’s social history.

In this day when you think you’ve seen everything and experience has jaded your reasoning, it is a jolt to discover something truly unique which takes your breath away.

Elke was a flight attendant from Paris. Richard was an engineer from California.

It’s a long way from the small, plastic Kodak Brownie with no film that he acquired as a 6-year-old to the incredible collection of world-famous cameras he owns today, but Larry Wapnick wouldn’t trade that journey for anything.

Her art form is called assemblage – a cross between sculpture and collage that involves more cutting and fitting than the traditional skills of molding and carving.