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earlier as a kid when the place looked nothing like it does now. As we talked, he started mentally sketching the storyline from memory. Flower farms where Martin Downs sits today, Sailfish Point as nothing but open beach, no Indian River Plantation…not even the road. He remembers driving past Stuart Beach just to get onto MacArthur, when Conchy Joe’s was still Seymour’s, with a drive-through window for cocktails before heading out to the sand. He graduated when the area still had what he calls a loose, almost bohemian feel, and his first house was right here in Jensen Beach, in what’s now the Art Cottages. “It was kind of a hippie atmosphere,” he said. “Like Edenlawn back then.” From there he moved into real estate and auctioneering. Once you meet him, that part makes sense. He knows how to talk to people. After a short stint as a waiter in Ft. Lauderdale, he moved back to Stuart and opened a glass studio. Successfully crafting nautical etched glass for restaurants, homes and sports fishing yachts, his studio thrived. Years of the daily grind fizzled Jay into a state of burnout. He closed shop and clocked into cruise ships, selling art on the sea—which, he fully admits, he talked his way into. “I didn’t know what I was doing at first,” he said, laughing. “I just went for it.” He worked for Park West Galleries, orchestrating art sales on cruise ships sailing quick loops from Miami to the Bahamas, and stopping in places like Nassau. Three to four day trips, new passengers each time, everyone relaxed and ready to spend. Eventually traveling further

hands-on approach to art was more his calling. That led him to Las Vegas during its construction boom, where he got back into glass work and built another successful studio. It’s also where he met his lovely wife, Nancy. From there, they sold everything and headed to Belize, building a beachfront home and settling into life on the Caribbean until the real estate collapse brought them back to Florida in 2009, where they now call Frazier Creek home. Back in his studio, all of that shows up in his work. Painting started slowly, one piece a year at first, then more, until it became his main focus. “I still don’t really think of myself as a painter,” he said. “I’m just having fun with it.” Back at his Jensen Beach property with his studio set up for everything from glass to paint, he’s deep into it. His “Yearbook Girls” series pulls inspiration from old 1950s yearbook photos. Using the stoic, expressionless portraits, he pushes them into something completely different. Alongside that, he’s experimenting with landscapes, flower fields, and mixed media, even talking about getting into printmaking. “Every day is a school day,” he said. After decades of commission work, steady but limiting, this feels different. “It was a blessing and a curse,” he said. “Now I’m doing it for me.” The afternoon disappeared just beyond reach, there one minute and gone the next, leaving the feeling that there was still more to uncover. Local roots, the Bahamas, art at sea, glasswork in Las Vegas and it was clear as day, that Jay’s mantra is you just have to walk the path and see where it leads. And

sometimes that path leads beyond a metal junkyard dragon made of trumpets and trombones into an imaginative hideaway filled with creativity.

than he ever expected, he

went on a world voyage that took him to more than 35 countries. “It was great for a while,” he said. But a year and a half in, he found the

For more information call 772-678-8420 or visit: jaybashant.com

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Vol. 645 YA 25A

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