“Paint Louis, the largest graffiti festival in the world, began in 1997 and continued through 2001. It was revived in 2013 and is now world-renowned. In the shadow of The Gateway Arch along the Mississipi River, over 400 writers gather every Labor Day weekend, coming from across the U.S, and most recently Canada, Mexico, Germany, and Australia.” – from Paint Louis website 9/2025
Have you ever seen so much graffiti at one time? I bet not! St Louis is home to one of the most unique pieces of artwork. Recently as of 2001 St. Louis has been the home of one of the longest running graffiti festivals in the country Paint Louis.
is an experience that you have to see to believe. It is a simple premise, but is executed extremely well. Select artists to paint a flood wall. If you have ever traveled to St. Louis via E. St. Louis you will see the riverfront and just south of Interstate 64 you will see a long grayish wall that protects the lower lying buildings. This flood wall is the prime location for artwork. This event happens over three days which gives the artist ample time to complete their works. It is amazing to see of the artist don their gear to get started painting. Lots of lifts were rented to reach high places and some artist used long reaching ladders. Many people walked along the path and train tracks to watch the artists construct their murals.
Paint Louis is like watching many art shows and performances happening at once. Each artist has their own style and techniques that allow them to make these mural pieces in a short time. I know if you ask me to design, prime, and paint a section of wall that they had………….I would need a least a week. Vanna and I had the “grimlens” with us this trip. We walked a mile down and a mile back. It was perfect weather for the event to take place. Last year it was brutal with the heat and humidity. This year featured a lot of returning artists and it is always exciting to see local artists put up artwork. When you walk along the wall it is fun to find artists social media tags in the artwork. Some have QR codes and other use just the artwork as their tag and you can find them on various sites. This festival shines a light on art and the artists that are seen sometimes in a negative way.
I like to think of graffiti as a puzzle. Each puzzle comes with it’s own set of rules or guidelines. I watched an artist guide a visitor on how to read the names of the artists. The key to figuring out some of the puzzles could be distance. When you walk along the walk you can see fine details like how an artist used a crack in the wall to actually be a crack in the work. On the other side of the coin when you step away from the wall you can see the massive scope of the work. Giant faces looking down on you, epic scenes playing out over 30-40 foot spans of the wall. Artist linking up murals to form a theme. That is the beauty of the location of Paint Louis. It is tucked away and you really don’t ever see the wall unless you know where to look. All most as if the wall is graffiti itself to the city. Once you make it there it is an art experience created by your fellow human. I encourage you to go down there and take pictures to share with your friends. In the day and age where everything cost an arm and a leg, free humanistic experiences are what we need right now.
