IRVINE : Collage Selected as Winning Poster

A collage of rectangular portraits of the city’s highlights won the Chamber of Commerce’s poster contest for the best depiction of the city.

The color poster, created by Irvine graphic artist Pete Bixler, contains mini-portraits of a dozen locations in the city that, Bixler said, “capture what Irvine is today.”

The paintings are of lakes, parks and recreation areas, Wild Rivers, the San Joaquin wildlife preserve, Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre, Irvine Spectrum, orange groves, the Rancho San Joaquin Golf Course, the Civic Center, Irvine Valley College, Old Towne Irvine and UC Irvine.

“If that was all you saw of Irvine, you’d realize there was a lot of diversity there,” said Bixler, 33, who won $500 in the contest.

The chamber held the contest to find an image suitable for reproduction into posters. Twenty-nine artists entered the contest, ranging from an 8-year-old student who painted a blue flower with the slogan “Grow Happy in Irvine” to professional artists such as Bixler.

Among other slogans in the contest’s entries were “Irvine--It Doesn’t Get Better Than This” and “Irvine--A Planned Community.”

Stan Wolcott, president of the Irvine Chamber of Commerce and one of the contest judges, said he liked Bixler’s mini-images of the city because they “have symmetry to them and Pete captures the things that incorporate Irvine.”