As a kid, I spent numerous hours at the Women’s Club of Stuart. What made the biggest impression on me was a beautiful mural featuring birds of the Everglades— of which Stuart is part through the St Lucie River/Indian River Lagoon. This mural has resided on the back wall of the Women’s Club since 1962.
My fondest memories of the building itself where when my parents enrolled me in cotillion classes in 1974. I can still see all of us kids in the metal folding chairs, dressed up to the hilt. Girls with hats and gloves, and boys in suits! Awkwardly dancing the fox-trot, the Cha-Cha-Cha, and the waltz while slipping on the terrazzo floors. I remember Dave Harman, and how cute he was and how I wished he’d ask me to dance….I remember there were rumors that Tracy Chase and Cabot Lord kissed on the porch! We were in 5th grade! Hysterical!
So anyway, there is this wonderful mural at the back of the women’s club and all my life really, I have wondered about it and finally I have learned. My mother shared a 2009 “Reflections” magazine, a publication for members of the Historical Society of Central Florida. In this magazine, there is an article about artist, Joy Postle. Joy Postle is the artist who created the mural at the back of the Stuart Women’s Club, and in many other famous places across our state and our nation. She is so cool I want to share her story.
She must have been an iconoclast of her era. Way ahead of her time. She was not only an artist but dancer as well. Today I believe we would call her a “performance artist. According to the article written by Denise Hall:
“Postle combined her artistic abilities, her musical talents, and her love for Florida bird life in performances she called “Glamour Birds of the Americas.” She would describe the birds she loved and paint them in the presence of an audience, with her husband, Bob, accompanying her with music and recordings of bird calls he had recorded himself…She would even mimic the fascinating mating dances the egrets and herons would perform for each other. Even in old age, Joy could still mime these dances…”
Mrs Postle performed for adults and well as for school children and well into “advanced age.” Apparently the children absolutely loved her!
“By reinterpreting nature with her own artistic flair. Postle turned a spotlight on the natural Florida that was carelessly threatened and destroyed during her life time.”
Although I never saw Joy Postle perform, she was an inspiration to me. She helped me appreciate Stuart for what it really is, part of the Everglades…
If you get a chance while driving along East Ocean Boulevard, stick your head inside the Women’s Club, or take a closer look at the mural if you are a regular there. You just may see the ghost of Joy Postle dancing and be inspired!
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Women’s Club of Stuart, Florida: (http://www.gfwcwomansclubofstuart.com)
Joy Postle, Fine Art:(http://flafineart.blogspot.com/2013/08/artist-spotlight-joy-postle-by-florida.html)
Joy Postle’s art/images: (http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=joy+postle+art&qpvt=joy+postle+art&qpvt=joy+postle+art&FORM=IGRE)
Joy Postle: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joy_Postle)
Thanks, Jacqui. I always wondered how the murals came to life. Also, I remember
watching all you “kids” dancing there as a chaperone!!
Yes! There had to be chaperones! 🙂 Thank you Nancy!
Quite a creative artist! Looks like the mural needs a little TLC to keep it from deteriorating so future generations can enjoy.
Yes Janet! I does and I hope we protect it. Some others in town like at First National Bank which is now SeaCoast were destroyed. They were awesome too. Good to hear from you! I have been learning here and there about Lake Apopka. 🙂
Wonderful, another local jewel brought to light. I am going to stop in and have a look..
🙂
awesome story. ok so where the Jacqui at cotillion practice photo!
btw if you ever get to highland hammocks state part they have an awesome cypress forrest walk there. It’s magical. the photo take themselves.
Thanks so much I have never been.
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Rick Crary Went to my 1st dance there around 1966.
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Alice L. Luckhardt That mural is being restored to its glory days of decades ago.
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Eve Samples Love this, Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch.
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Greg Leatherman My wife just restored this mural! The chips and so forth in these photos have been expertly and lovingly repaired.
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Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch Alice L. Luckhardt thank you! I will go in a see! So awesome! It’s been awhile since I’ve been inside.
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Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch Greg Leatherman I can’t believe your wife did the restoration! Small world and very cool! Wished I had realized the situation and stopped in to see her work. A real art form to be able to restore historic works.
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Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch Eve Samples thank you. Your complement is like getting an A plus.
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Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch Rick Crary would have loved to see you in 1966. What days we grew up in!
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Norma Leighton Beautiful mural at the Woman’s Club. So glad you decided to play detective. Such a cute story about the cotillion dance classes.
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Alice L. Luckhardt Joy Postle did several similar murals in Stuart. In the original Citizens Bank (now Duffy’s Restaurant) was a mural done in 1948, in the Seacoast Bank at Colorado and US 1 – two murals of flora and fauna of the Everglades done in 1961, back when it was First National (it is now covered up with paneling – north side of the lobby) and also 1959 five original individual wood framed paintings depicting an egret, spoonbill, ducks, cypress swamp and a Florida sunset in the pine woods were displayed at the school cafeteria in Stuart, paid for from profits of ice cream sales at the lunchroom. The only one still visual today is the one done by Joy for the Woman’s Club in the early 1960s.
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Jacqui Thurlow-Lippisch Alice L. Luckhardt fascinating! Wish they had photographed before covered or destroyed….
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Alice L. Luckhardt Would’ve — Could’ve — Should’vd
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