Ivan Montoya

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Ivan Montoya is a Detroit-based painter and muralist. Ivan, along with his family, emigrated from Chihuahua, Mexico to Michigan in 2000. He creates paintings that express the Mexican-American diaspora through folkloric symbolism. In his mural work, Ivan aims to inspire wonder and foster a sense of collective harmony, bridging the viewers with each other and the physical space the wall inhabits. He earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the College for Creative Studies in 2017 and received the Imre J. Molnar Artistic Achievement Award, appointing him a merit-based valedictorian. He is a recipient of the 2022 Emerging Artist Fellowship supported by the Knight Foundation and is featured in the New American Paintings Midwest issue for 2023. In 2025, he received the prestigious Kresge Artist Fellowship.