The Vero Beach Museum of Art was a beehive of activity recently during its Family Programs’ free admission day.
Several of the goings-on were related to the outgoing exhibition, Well-Dressed: Artworks from the Permanent Collection, which was on display through Sept. 14.
Students from the Indian River Charter High School fashion program had a pop-up show in the hallway, offering a glimpse at their upcoming Fashion for Legacy runway fashion show they were planning for the school.
“The show will feature our student produced collections, like what you see here today, and then we’re also partnering with three local boutiques, In Motion and Patchington on the beachside and then Seahorse Lane in downtown Vero Beach. It’s like a fusion of the community and our student designs,” said Lexie Crusciel, IRCHS fashion director.
“Today is just like a sneak peek. The pieces that the girls are wearing are either not fully completed; like they still have some details to add or they’re not paired with exactly what they’re going to run in the runway,” she added.
Other IRCHS students in the program assisted younger visitors with a special Well-Dressed edition of Sketching in the Galleries.
The busy little hands of the younger crowd showed off their own creativity painting bandannas during the Wearable Wonders-themed artmaking activity.
“We wanted to do shirts, but there are too many sizes. Bandannas can be worn as a scarf or a head covering; we even had people saying they were making them for their dog,” said Sophia Strazinsky, VBMA art educator. She added that the project had been so popular they ran out of bandannas before noon and needed to switch to paper.
A presentation by Barbara Schlitt Ford, executive director of the Environmental Learning Center, and Liz Yerian, its education coordinator, spoke to the history and environmental importance of our biodiverse Indian River Lagoon.
To emphasize the roles of some of the lesser-known animals in Florida’s ecosystem, the ELC also brought along a Florida box turtle and a small red rat snake and, to the delight of young and old alike, allowed people to interact with them.
The ELC talk tied into the exhibit by artists Annie Blazejack and Geddes Levenson, A Tangled Plot, on display through Oct. 5, which focuses on their shared concerns about Florida’s fragile environment. Later in the afternoon, the artists were on hand to answer questions about their work and to sign their catalogs.
And finally, visitors that day were the first to view the new exhibit in the Stark Gallery, Picasso and the Progressive Proof: Linocut Prints from a Private Collection, on display through Jan. 4.
Another new exhibition, Recent Acquisition Highlights, to Jan. 11, showcases the diverse range of works in the museum’s permanent collection, from early American masterpieces to contemporary art, acquired within the past few years.
For more information, visit VBMuseum.org.
Photos by Joshua Kodis
