Join us at the Santa Paula Art Museum on Saturday, January 17, 2026, for the premiere of “Muses and Inspirations: The Art of Vladimir and Gösta Iwasiuk — A Father and Son Exhibition.” The exhibit spans more than half a century of sculptures, paintings, and drawings by longtime Ventura County surgeon Gösta Iwasiuk and his father, Vladimir Iwasiuk (1905-1986), and explores the subjects that inspired them most: medicine, music, art, and family.
Admission to the premiere party is $5.00 for SPAM members and $10.00 for non-members. “Muses and Inspirations” will be on view from January 17, 2026, to May 10, 2026.
More About Vladimir Iwasiuk:
Dr. Vladimir Iwasiuk was born in 1905 in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in a region that is now part of Ukraine. After medical school, he maintained a private practice in his hometown of Czernowitz until the onset of WWII. After Czernowitz was overrun by the Russian army, Vladimir continued to work as a doctor but refused to carry out orders from Moscow that he deemed harmful, and he was sentenced to death. He and his wife, Olga, escaped to Germany despite fears that his Jewish ancestry would be a death sentence there as well. Fortunately, he was assigned as a doctor in a small alpine village in Austria, where he remained for the rest of the war.
After the war, Vladimir worked for the U.S. occupation forces, which enabled him and his family to emigrate to the United States in 1954. Following 10 years at Peoria State Hospital in Illinois, he relocated his family to Los Angeles, where he worked at a Veterans Hospital. Vladimir retired from medicine in 1974 and settled in Santa Paula in 1976. Throughout his life, Vladimir studied and created art in a variety of media, painting up until the day he died in 1986.
More About Gösta Iwasiuk:
Dr. Gösta Iwasiuk was born in Linz, Austria, in 1943. His family emigrated to the United States in 1954. Gösta started medical school at the University of Illinois at Chicago and completed his M.D. at UCLA, graduating with honors. He interned at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center and completed his residency in General Practice at Ventura County Hospital, where he served as Chief Resident in his final year.
Following a military tour of duty in the Air Force during the Vietnam War, Gösta returned to Ventura County to start his practice as a general physician. After ten years, he decided to train as a surgeon and went on to perform more than 11,000 surgeries over a 44-year career. He spent seven years as a Professor of Surgery at Ventura Community Memorial Hospital, where he trained more than a dozen young surgeons. He also served as president of the Ventura County Medical Society and as chief of staff at both Santa Paula Memorial Hospital and Ventura County Medical Center.
Since retiring from surgery in 2018, Gösta has focused on his passion for bronze sculpture, employing the lost-wax casting method. He credits much of his artistic skill and knowledge to his father, Vladimir.