Welcome to the Pueblo Levee Mural Project home page and galleries. 

Pueblo Levee Mural Project became "The Largest Outdoor Mural Gallery in the World" in the Guinness World Book of Records from 1995-2016. We had the world record for over 20 years.  These murals span the concrete levee wall along the Historic Arkansas River in Pueblo, Colorado. The levee wall was built after the Great Pueblo 1921 Flood that left downtown Pueblo under 25 ft. of water. The river waters were diverted to the present location, and this 65 ft. tall concrete wall was built to protect the city from future large floods.  Our record was 200,000 sq. ft.

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 Currently, 2020-2025 Creating the New Levee Murals

    After removing all the historic murals along the levee, the Pueblo Levee Mural Project regrouped with the Pueblo Conservancy District to start over on the new concrete wall. Cynthia Ramu, the Pueblo Levee Mural Project Muralist/Coordinator since 1992, partnered with the Pueblo Conservancy District to put new Levee Mural Guidelines and mural submissions process, and collaborate on getting new murals on the Pueblo Levee wall in fall 2021.  The new wall is 30 feet tall on a 40-degree slope, so we can walk or repel as we paint on the murals.  We have been painting year-round, adding new murals each month. (The original wall was over 60 feet tall at a 45-degree angle)

      To date, we are still working on breaking the US Record held by Wichita, Kansas record of 170,000 sq ft. Next is to break the World Record for the "Longest Outdoor Mural in the World," which is held by Souel, South Korea. Their record is 254,000 sq. ft. 

     We have over 100 muralists who have painted over 125 murals on the Pueblo Levee Murals to date, and a handful of new murals is coming this year. Our current measures are at 130,000 sq. ft., and our goal is to complete 260,000 to break the world record.  

 

 

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The Pueblo Levee Mural's Story

In 1978, a group of USC/CSU-Pueblo students and local artists known as the TEE HEE’s band together to start one of the first organized murals to be painted on the levee wall.  But at this time, it was illegal to paint there, so they had to do it late at night.  So this is where the "Fish in the Bathtub" on the 4th Street Bridge was born.  The students spent months planning how to carry the paint, work in the dark with flashlights, and have lookouts in case the police came.  Some of the neighbors saw their flashlights and heard them whistle to each other and the police made an attempt to catch the students.  But just as they finished the fish, they made their escape on one of the trains heading east and jumped off at the Union Depot, ran down Union Ave, and found shelter at the Branch Inn with Joey, the owner.  He was just closing the bar down and letting them sleep behind the bar for the night. This quickly became an issue of whether the painting on the levee should be legal or not.  At that time, our current District Attorney Gus Sandstrom was running for District Attorney and proposed that painting should become legal with a permit. 

          In 1979, local artist Dave Roberts, the 1980s organizer of the Levee Murals, created a yearly Paint-A-Thon during May for any artists that come to paint the levee, and he would supply all of the paint.  Roberts would go to paint stores around southern Colorado and repurpose all of their old latex paint by recycling it by painting on the levee.  In the early 1990s, Roberts became the major paint recycler for Colorado, and to this day, Southern Colorado Recycling works sorting paint, donating to the levee artists, and recycling in Pueblo.

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   Be sure to follow us on social media at https://www.facebook.com/PuebloLeveeMuralProject 

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