Boulevard Saint-Laurent transforms into open-air gallery during Mural Festival

For eleven days this June, Boulevard Saint-Laurent became a living canvas as local and international muralists painted the street into a massive outdoor museum. The 2026 edition of the Mural Festival transformed a stretch of the Main into a gallery without walls, with artists working from scaffolding and lifts to cover building facades in new work.

The festival draws muralists from across Canada and around the globe, each bringing their own style and vision to the neighborhood. The result is a constantly evolving public art landscape that changes the visual character of one of the city's most iconic commercial corridors.

HighOnCity photographers Adil Boukind, Guillaume Levasseur, and Valérian Mazataud documented not just the finished murals but the artists themselves at work—the process of creation that fills those eleven days. The images capture the energy of the festival: the scale of the work, the detail of each piece, and the way the neighborhood becomes a meeting place for artists and residents who gather to watch the transformation happen in real time.

The Mural Festival has become an annual fixture on the cultural calendar, drawing crowds and attracting media attention as major international and local artists stake their mark on the city's walls.