Ivan Munk
American, 1937-2006
Davenport Hotel
Biography
Ivan Munk spent his entire life imagining Spokane’s (WA) past. Everything he did in a diverse career — illustrator, painter, television producer, restorer of historic buildings — comes together in this idea: the utter importance and particularity of Spokane’s moments. He painted dozens of full-scale depictions of Spokane’s past. A series showing different eras at Eastern Washington University is on permanent display in EWU’s Showalter Hall. A few of his house paintings were collected in a calendar in 1989. In these full-scale paintings, he created not only a painstakingly accurate reproduction of the buildings, but also the beauty and mood of the surrounding neighborhoods and Spokane’s lost moments.