Under the oaks

Vero Beach's three-day event among top 200 of its type in the nation

By ELLIOTT JONES
elliott.jones@scripps.com
March 10, 2007

VERO BEACH — After a 20-hour flight from Israel, artist Yoram Gal was rushing and sweating: he couldn't get the last two boxes of his fresh paintings boarded on the airplane for the final leg of his journey to the Under the Oaks sale and show. So the 55-year-old Israeli went ahead Thursday, flying from New Jersey to Miami.
Then he drove to Vero Beach, just in time to get his display set up for the opening on Friday, the first day of the three-day show that continues today and Sunday. He had to get there. "This is an important show," said Gal, who displayed some paintings he had left in a van in Miami from a previous trip to the United States.
Then last night he planned to drive to Miami to get the boxes of paintings the airplane was forwarding to him.
More than 629 artists and photographers applied to get in. Only 212 were selected, said Roz Duflo, coordinator of the three-day show that attracts up to 80,000 visitors each year. The 59th annual Under the Oaks show is among the top 200 events of its type in the nation, based on quality and size, she said.
So artists come from throughout the United States — even from overseas, in Geal's case — to offer items such as handmade Italian lambskin purses with silver and semiprecious stones, costing $1,195.
Carver Jia Justin, of Philadelphia, displayed a 3-foot-tall wooden carving that took a year to make: fish and turtles in a coral reef. The price tag is $5,788.
But there are also small trinkets, such as the necklace 9-year-old Pennsylvania resident Courtney Howell picked out under the watchful eyes of her grandmother, part-time Vero Beach resident Dottie Howell.
Dangling from the necklace was a dark blue piece of glass tumbled smooth by the ocean washing on the beach. It reminded her of Cape Cod's Martha's Vinyard, where she spends summers on the beaches.
Most of what she saw Friday at Under the Oaks "is for adults," Courtney said, while holding the necklace and pointing out a metal swirl on it. "This is really cool." As her grandmother sees it, Under the Oaks "is fabulous."
A group of people were silent, listening to Brooker resident Gene Jaeger playing "Amazing Grace" on a handmade $300 psaltery that has a fine, harp-like sound.
Wisconsin winter visitor Audrey Delafield listened, thinking of an old lyre harp at home. "This is a wonderful show," she said. For Gal, the show is a breathe of freedom.
In Europe, buyers are more fickle, tending to purchase from galleries and rely on art critics in making choices, he said. The United States has outdoor art shows where customer just walk up and buy what they like. "It is a risk coming here, having to spend many thousands of dollars" in travel expenses to showcase his paintings made of canvas and water-based paints and other mediums. Some are realistic, such as one of a duck running. One is of the waterfront were he lives: Old Jaffa, home of the Biblical Jonah and the whale story.
Most are abstract, colorful emotional representations of things such as a night in Jerusalem.
This is his third Under the Oaks show and from here he goes to New Jersey and Texa, before flying back to Israel to visit his wife and young son — embracing as in one of his paintings entitled "triangle embrace." Then he'll fly back for a show in Austin, Texas.
He was an officer in the military in Israel and knows the tensions in his country. "It is a love-hate relationship," he said. "We argue between ourselves. There are a hundred views of what is going on. There are tensions. Yet, I love Israel. We are passionate, fighting to keep it alive.
"I do like to get out and breathe a little," he said, as he stood by his paintings under the oak trees in the quiet of Riverside Park. "There is death and war. That makes me try even harder to have fun and smile. We have enough of the other."
What: An outdoor juried art show with 212 artists from Florida and the United States
When: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday
Where: Vero Beach's Riverside Park, south of the eastern end of the Merrill Barber Bridge
Typical attendance: 80,000 during the three-day show that started Friday
Admission: Free
Parking: Free parking in park, plus a shuttle for parking in nearby MacWilliams Park
Concessions: Food and drink for sale
Information: List of exhibits and information are available at Vero Beach Art Club tent at the entryway.
Organizers: Vero Beach Art Club, a group of 562 members
Proceeds: Pay for scholarships for high-school seniors and education of art club members