The Vero Beach Art Club — Vero Beach, Florida

The Vero Beach Art Club is a membership organization of working and amateur artists, registered as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, that has operated in Vero Beach since 1936. Its history page traces it to six artists who called themselves the Vero Beach Sketch Club, a name the group traded for the Vero Beach Art Club when it incorporated in 1954. The club now reports more than 600 members.

In October 2026 the Vero Beach Art Club runs three things at once: a gallery and marketplace on 14th Avenue in the downtown Arts District, a calendar of juried outdoor shows from November to March, and a teaching program of classes, camps and workshops. Under the Oaks, its long-running March show in Riverside Park, is the event most residents know, but the show is one production of the club rather than the club itself.

Early Vero Beach had few organized arts groups. The Indian River Guardian reported in 2014 that when the Vero Beach Theatre Guild was chartered in 1958, it was one of only two cultural organizations in Vero Beach, the other being the Vero Beach Art Club, which by then had spent more than two decades as a sketch club and an incorporated society.

The club's push for a building began in 1978, when it opened negotiations with the City of Vero Beach for a site for an art academy and gallery. According to the club, it was granted space in the Riverside Park complex and joined the Alliance for the Arts in planning an art-centered facility. Ground was broken in 1981 on the site of today's Vero Beach Museum of Art, and the building opened in 1986 on Riverside Park Drive with the Art Club and the museum as co-tenants.

That arrangement shifted as the museum grew. Vero News reported in June 2016, during the club's 80th year, that the club office was inside the Vero Beach Museum of Art on Riverside Drive. When the club opened its own Annex in March 2020, its president told Vero News that the club had not had its own space for over 20 years, and that all classes would move to the Annex while a small office stayed at the museum.

The Vero Beach Art Club Annex opened with a ribbon cutting during the March 2020 First Friday Gallery Stroll, in the Corner Shoppes complex that also holds the Raw Space Gallery and Project Space 1785. A 2021 club announcement in Vero News gave the Annex address as 1903 14th Avenue, a short walk from Gallery 14 at 1911 14th Avenue in the historic Arts District.

The 14th Avenue space now serves as gallery, shop and classroom. The club's home page lists hours of Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., names the Janette Beach Gallery as its exhibit room, and gives First Friday Gallery Stroll hours of 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. According to the Gallery and Marketplace page, members hang a new themed, juried exhibit every six weeks, while artist and artisan members stock the adjoining Marketplace. The Friday after each new hanging, galleries across the downtown Vero Beach Arts District open for Gallery Stroll.

The club's season runs from autumn into March. The Fall Fine Arts Festival is scheduled for November 14 and 15, 2026 at the IG Center Wiggins Field on 9th Street SW, with entries in 12 categories, a $35 application fee and a $250 booth fee for a 10 by 10 foot space, according to the festival page. It is open to members and non-members.

Art in the Park, in its 45th annual season, sets up member artists in front of Humiston Park on Ocean Drive on selected Sundays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The 2026 to 2027 schedule begins Sunday, November 8, 2026 and ends Sunday, March 21, 2027. The members' show Art by the Sea reaches its 38th edition on January 9 and 10, 2027, moving to the Bethel Creek House on A1A.

Under the Oaks closes the season in Riverside Park. The club's Under the Oaks page lists the 76th annual show for March 12, 13 and 14, 2027, after the 75th show in 2026, and describes over 200 artists and over 50,000 visitors a year. The same page calls the show the club's biggest fundraiser of the year. Indoors, the Indian River County Main Library exhibit, in its 32nd year, hangs member work in the library's main entrance on 21st Street from September 22 to December 15, 2026, for up to 15 artists with no entry fee.

Teaching was part of the club from 1936, according to the club president quoted by Vero News in 2020, and the 14th Avenue Annex was opened largely to bring classes back under the club's own roof. In October 2021, Vero News carried the club's announcement that multi-day workshops were returning to the Annex, with a three-day mixed media session priced at $350, or $330 for members.

The club's youth and junior page lists a youth membership for ages 5 to 11 at $25 a year and a junior membership for ages 12 to 17 at $50 a year, plus home school art classes at the 14th Avenue gallery on Mondays from 1:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m., beginning October 5, 2026. A separate program for veterans and first responders offers complimentary painting and drawing classes every third Wednesday from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the same Vero Beach address.

Two member groups meet outside the classroom calendar. The Vero Beach Art Club plein air painters meet on Tuesdays at 9:30 a.m. at outdoor sites around Indian River County, and the club's photography forum gathers on the second Tuesday evening of each month at the Gallery and Marketplace, according to club program pages.

Scholarships are written into the Vero Beach Art Club mission, which commits the club to award annual grants to art teachers and scholarships to students pursuing art degrees. In 2016, Vero News reported a $3,000 scholarship presented on the club's Scholarship Day. In March 2025, Vero News reported two 2025 awards of $2,000 each to seniors at Sebastian River High School and Vero Beach High School, paid directly to each student's college financial aid office.

The 2026 season is the club's 90th. Its anniversary page describes a $90 for 90 Years campaign, one dollar for each year since 1936, with $90 donors acknowledged in a 90th Anniversary Booklet. The club opened the anniversary year with a kickoff party at the Heritage Center in Vero Beach and says proceeds support scholarships, educational programs and community art outreach.