“Art on the Square,” a two-day Premiere Juried Outdoor Fine Art Show presented by the Cornell Art Museum, returns to Old School Square in Downtown Delray Beach on November 7–8, 2026. Set on the museum’s front lawn and Swinton lawn, the free event invites visitors to stroll the historic campus, meet artists, and acquire original work while enjoying live music and refreshments.
The show will feature approximately 100 juried artists, live mural painting demonstrations, a children’s art space, and local nonprofit participants including Art Connect, Urban Sketchers, and Creative Art School, with awards presented in First, Second, and Third Place categories.
Among the artists featured at this year’s show is Del-ray Beach photographer and photo artist Jake Packard, whose immersive aerial and landscape prints capture the coast, natural scenes, and South Florida light. A “verified human artist” who works in materials including metal, canvas, acrylic, and paper, Packard represents the kind of local creative talent the Cornell Art Museum aims to spotlight alongside regional and national artists. Visitors to Art on the Square can meet Packard, explore his work, and experience firsthand the diverse art offerings that make Downtown Delray Beach a cultural destination.
5 Local Artists to Watch
 BEN BONART (Painting & Gold Leaf) benbonart.com benbonartanddesign@gmail.com “Every Season” |  ERIN ASHLEY (Painting and Collage) erinashleyart.com erin@erinashleyart.com “Stars Wish” |  EVAN REINHEIMER (Kite Photography) evanreinheimer.com evanx83@gmail.com “Muizenberg Huts” |  SIP-TSHUN NG (Mixed Media) tshunart.com tshunart@gmail.com “Conversation” |  JAKE PACKARD (Photography) jakepackardphotoart.com jake@firsttake.com “Colorful Butterfly” |
JAKE PACKARD
A Brief Glimpse into artist Jake Packard’s Delray Beach Perspective
Delray Beach-based photographer and photo artist Jake Packard creates immersive aerial and landscape prints that capture South Florida’s coast, natural scenes, and distinctive light. His path—from Harvard’s darkrooms and a video production career to full-time photo art—has shaped a singular approach to image-making.
Delray Beach is both his home and creative base. Packard, who grew up in New York thinking Florida was “just for old people,” moved to the area 15 years ago after decades of visits. He cites the beautiful weather and photographic opportunities, along with a community that loves his work and comes from across the states and around the world. He also praises the closeness of Delray’s art community and the gallery he belongs to, Posh, where artists support one another.
His aerial prints, with titles such as Serenity at Sunset and Moonlit Flight Over Beach, reflect his fascination with altitude and scope. As his drone rises, he sees more of the world—including Delray’s mile-and-a-quarter stretch of undeveloped beach, which he calls unlike anywhere else. His images combine natural beauty and human civilization, creating a contrast that resonates with viewers. “My goal is to provide a beautiful picture for people that love this area,” he says.
Scale matters in Packard’s work. His large, immersive prints are meant to fill viewers with the same feeling he has on the beach. “When I take a picture, I am looking out past the uni-verse,” he says. “I want those pictures to be bigger so that people can get the same feeling as I do.”
Packard is listed as a “verified hu-man artist,” a distinction that matters in an era of AI-generated imagery. While he notes AI has existed in Photoshop for years, he sees prompting a computer as fundamentally different from photography. “You didn’t use your body, take an hour or two shooting it,” he says. “Art really has to come from the human soul, the human spirit, then it can be refined with technological means but it has to start with a person.”
The Atlantic Ave Magazine cover image of a Roseate Spoonbill tells another Delray story. Packard captured it at Green Cay on a spring evening, as the sun went down and several spoonbills perched on a dead tree. One bird looked straight into the sunset, its wings matching the clouds behind it. For Packard, the image shows that Delray is more than nightlife and beach—it is a unique place with extraordinary wildlife.
His advice to emerging artists is simple: love the work, show it to others, and pursue art shows and events. They can be expensive, requiring tents and display setups, but “if you want to be known you got to go through those steps.”
