El Salvador artists reclaim gang-marked walls through mural festival

Urban artists are reclaiming public spaces in El Salvador through the Pigmen Trip festival, an itinerant event that has been traveling across the country for eight years. The festival recently arrived in the mountain village of Concepción de Ataco, where artists are painting murals of jaguars, flowers, birds, and local faces on walls that were previously used by gangs to mark their territory.

Isaac Sosa, the founder and organizer of the festival, noted that the atmosphere has shifted significantly following the decline of gang power. He stated that while it was once a source of fear to paint in public due to gang siege, the environment is now more peaceful and offers greater freedom of expression. Since its inception, the festival has produced more than 200 murals.

The event brings together local Salvadoran talent alongside international artists from Colombia, Mexico, Brazil, Peru, and Argentina. Participants described the transition from a time when they had to carefully plan locations and contacts to avoid gang-controlled zones to the current ability to work with more liberty, viewing art as a tool for social transformation.