A 22-mile stretch of the Frio Canyon is about to become an open-air gallery. The first TerraTx Art and Mural Festival runs September 25 through 27, 2026, connecting Leakey in Real County to Concan in Uvalde County with murals, music, dancers, animals and other activities spread across multiple venues each day, all free to the public.
The event is built around the theme “Legends of the Land,” and organizers say the art on display was shaped directly by the people who live in the canyon. According to TerraTx Art Festival, participating muralists and performers were paired with local historians, ranchers, naturalists, birders and musicians to gather oral histories that informed each public artwork and installation. Leah Guerrero, the festival's founder, and artist Matt Tumlinson discussed the project with WOAI, which reports that artists were paired with local experts and are creating art based on the stories, people and other features of the region.
Eight Artists, One Canyon Corridor
The lineup of muralists installing permanent public works during the festival includes eight regional Texas artists: Matt Tumlinson, Britt Johnson, J Muzacz, Carmen Rangel, FeeBee, Lys Santamaria, Andrea Holmes and Dan Trelenberg, per the festival's schedule. One concrete example of the community-pairing process comes from artist Andrea Holmes, known for her global “100 Bird Mural Project,” who collaborated with local birder Lauren Cummings on a large-scale mural highlighting bird species native to the Frio Canyon — a corridor recognized as a birdwatching destination along major migratory flyways.
Tumlinson brings his own history of turning small Texas towns into canvases. The San Antonio-based, eighth-generation Texan first gained national recognition for creating what became known as “brass canvas” oil paintings, rendered on thousands of spent bullet casings collected from gun ranges, work that MySA reported was designed to provoke open dialogue on gun culture and Texas identity. Starting in 2015, Tumlinson began transforming the West Texas oil town of Rankin — population roughly 850 — into an open-air gallery by painting eight large-scale murals on commercial and civic walls, according to Texas Co-op Power, which noted Rankin embraced the murals to build a civic identity beyond local high school sports.
Where to Find the Art in Leakey and Concan
In Leakey, exhibition hubs for the festival include the Real County Historical Museum, the Historic Beard House, Common Grounds Coffee and the American Legion Building, which will host a student art contest exhibition, per the festival's published schedule. The festival also lists venues at Gypsy Sally's and The Springs Retreat in Leakey, while the Concan side of the event centers on the Uvalde County Visitor Center, sitting next to the Frio River. Festival hours begin at 3 p.m. local time, and organizers can be reached at 830-834-5534 for planning details.
Filling the Off-Season Calendar
The festival is sponsored by Visit Uvalde County, which is backing the free event as a way to encourage shoulder-season tourism and regional cultural engagement across Uvalde and Real counties. The Frio Canyon stretches roughly 20 miles along U.S. Highway 83 in the western Texas Hill Country, linking the mountain community of Leakey to Concan near Garner State Park, according to Texas Highways Magazine.
That corridor is best known for summer river recreation, drawing large crowds to Garner State Park, but Texas Highways notes that public access to the Frio River itself is largely limited to roadside crossings and private lodges. That makes free public events like TerraTx significant for broader, year-round community access, and off-season programming of this kind has become a tool for sustaining local businesses once summer tubing traffic fades. Organizers can be followed on social media at the handle @terratxartfest, and more details are available through the festival's own listings.
