For the last four decades a group of muralists in the French city of Lyon has been transforming the city into a massive outdoor art gallery. Huge murals painted in the trompe l’oeil style cover walls all over Lyon depicting historical events or famous people or mundane moments of everyday life. As of now, there are more than 150 murals across Lyon.

Lyon’s love affair with mural art started in the early 1970s, when a group of local students decided to bring art out of the confines of galleries and museums and into the streets and within reach of ordinary people. In 1978, CitéCréation, their student cooperative movement, was born.

“Wall of the Canuts” in Lyon. Photo credit: thierry llansades/Flickr