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The Sacred Images Mural at Timpanogos High School is unveiled on Friday, Feb. 25, 2022.

Ashtyn Asay, Daily Herald

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Students admire the Sacred Images Mural at Timpanogos High School at the unveiling on Friday, Feb. 25, 2022.

Ashtyn Asay, Daily Herald

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Anyone who walks into the main entrance of Timpanogos High School will now be greeted by an elaborate and colorful mural celebrating the culture and history of the school.

Timpanogos High School celebrated the unveiling of the Sacred Images Mural on Friday, a project that students and faculty collaborated with professional artists to produce.

The mural was created in partnership with the Utah Center for Documentary Expression & Art, an organization that is, according to its website, is dedicated to using documentary work to help Utahns understand the state’s past and present. They also seek to educate on the state’s greater connection to the United States and the world.

Dimi Macheras, a visual artist and illustrator, visited Timpanogos over the course of a month to complete the 5-foot-by-15-foot mural. Dozens of students contributed ideas and images to be used the mural. It was Macheras’ job to turn them into a cohesive design that the school could be proud of and the students felt a share of ownership over.

“It’s been a lot of fun, it’s been really cool to operate with Ms. Davis, the faculty has all made me feel really at home here, it’s kept me enthusiastic and excited for a whole month to be working on this,” Macheras said. “Shoutout to the students who were involved in this, it was really cool to work alongside all of you, you’re all so creative and inspirational, I think we made like a really awesome design together.”

Mount Timpanogos, the Timpanogos Cave National Monument, timberwolves, and the images of five students — Fynn Pedersen, Nephi Matagi, Drew Clark, Catalina Casallas and Talan Gardner — all made it into the final mural design.

In addition to working with Macheras, students were able to hear poems and draw inspiration from Jimmy Santiago Baca, an award-winning writer and poet, who visited the school for the unveiling.

Anna Davis, a visual arts teacher at Timpanogos, was integral to the mural project. According to Davis, the primary purpose of creating the mural was to bring the members of the school together in a meaningful way.

“This whole project is about unifying our school, connecting with each other, sharing our stories, realizing that you’re not alone, other people are feeling those things that you’re feeling,” Davis said. “One of the ways we wanted to do that is to celebrate the diversity of our school. I love that we try to spread our reach far and bring in as many students’ voices as possible into this mural.”

Several student projects spun off the creation of the mural. A group of students from the T-Wolf TV class has begun producing their own short documentary about the process. Three students also helped to create a website for the mural project where anyone can go to view a photo gallery of the process and, eventually, view the student-made documentary.

Students from several classes shared their own personal stories, which were recorded and posted on the project’s website. The student website can be found at http://thsmural.surge.sh.