The Westport Historical Society (WHS) later this month will host an exhibit celebrating the life and work of world renowned Westport illustrator Ed Vebell, 96, called “The Curious Case of Ed Vebell.”
Ed Vebell : legendary artist-illustrator. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Phyllis Groner for WestportNow.com
An opening reception will be held on Sunday, Jan. 28, from 2 to 4 p.m. with the exhibit continuing through April 28.
During World War II, longtime Westporter Vebell served as a field illustrator, choreographing battles for the military newspaper Stars and Stripes. He was also the official courtroom artist for the Nuremberg trials.
Vebell spent years overseas in exotic places such as Morocco and the cabarets of Paris. A renaissance man, who later worked decades as an illustrator for myriad publications including Sports Illustrated and Readers Digest, he also competed at the 1952 Olympics in fencing.
In 2017, he served as Westport’s Memorial Day grand marshal, even though bad weather forced cancellation of the parade and the ceremonies were held in Town Hall. (See WestportNow May 29, 2017)
Born in 1921 in Chicago, Vebell’s talent for drawing was evident at an early age. Upon graduating from high school, he won scholarships to three different art schools.
Vebell holds his portrait of Hermann Göring, the highest ranking Nazi tried at Nuremberg. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Phyllis Groner for WestportNow.com
It turned out that each art school ran its summer programs at different times of the day, morning, afternoon and evening. Vebell says he attended all three.
Upon finishing, he said, his work was in demand by a number of advertising agencies, as well as the Sears Roebuck catalog.
“I was 18, and I was making $400 a week from 1939 to 1940,” Vebell told WestportNow in 2016. (See WestportNow June 29, 2016) “I was able to buy two cars, and I wrecked them both.”
One of the accidents left him blind in the right eye.
“I was 18, and I paid for that accident the rest of my life,” he said.
But it did not stop him from drawing and succeeding in his craft, one that he credits for a life he calls lucky.
“I was so lucky to be an artist,” he said. “I was the luckiest soldier to be an artist.”
Vebell said initially he was assigned to be an aircraft gunner, an assignment that had claimed many lives. But when superiors learned he was an artist, he first job was to paint camouflage on planes.
“Later I got sent to Stars & Stripes,” he said. “Being an artist saved my life.”
From 1942 to 1947, Vebell served in North Africa and Europe.
.jpg)
Vebell’s Nuremberg portraits of Nazis Rudolf Hess (top) and Wilhelm Keitel. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Phyllis Groner for WestportNow.com
“I spent a whole year in Algeria,” he said. “For three months I rode with the French cavalry. I felt like Lawrence of Arabia.”
There, he also resumed another one of his passions forged in a Chicago club, fencing.
It was a hobby that after the war would cost him wounds to his chest, neck and groin, but rewarded him with gold and bronze medals, as well as being a finalist at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.
In 1953, he and his late wife, Elsa, settled into their Westport Quentin Road home he has lived in ever since. Elsa, who he says was a descendant of Spanish royalty, died 13 years ago.
“I guess I’m the last illustrator left in Westport,” he said. “When I arrived here, there were 200 of them. We were called the Westport Artists, not the artists’ school, just the Westport Artists, and we’d meet once a month. Nobody remembers them now.
“The town was unbelievable,” Vebell added. “You had the best talent in the United States, and they were all at one time in my studio.”
For further information on the exhibit, call (203) 222-1424 or visit http://www.westporthistory.org.
James Lomuscio contributed reporting.
