Imperial Valley College to celebrate alumni artists with mural dedication and gallery show

IMPERIAL COUNTY, Calif. (KYMA, KECY) - For Imperial Valley College's (IVC) 60th anniversary, the college will be celebrating alumni artists with two separate events on campus on Thursday, April 20.

There will be a mural dedication in the IVC Spencer Library at 3 p.m.

The Alumni Art Show will be held in the Juanita Salazar Lowe Art Gallery from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. with a reception as well.

The public is invited to attend both events and parking will be free.

The Alumni Art Show will showcase works spanning six decades of IVC art department graduates.

Types of visual artwork that will be presented include painting, drawing, sculptures and photography.

Graphic design, illustration and video will also be displayed.

IVC says gallery hours for the Spring 2023 Semester are from 2:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays and from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Wednesdays.

The mural was a part of a Spencer Library remodeling project in 2020 and Dr. Martha Garcia, then IVC superintendent/president, reached out to artist Roberto Pozos.

Pozos is a 1981 art major graduate of IVC and was asked to create a mural that would inspire students to achieve their goals.

“This is a mural that I’ve created from my heart because I went to this community college,” Pozos said. “I’m thankful to be asked to create this mural and to arrive at this point. It was important for me to have a story that dealt with the experience from Imperial Valley and from attending IVC.”

“It’s about transformation, change and about education that is going to take you places with different career choices," Pozos explained.

According to IVC, the mural was completed during the COVID-19 pandemic and it took almost a year to paint with more than 30 session visits.

IVC says the Alumni Art show will end on May 10 and a parking pass is required to visit the gallery.