San Marcos — Chicken George Zupp doesn’t just pride himself on his smoked chicken drumsticks. Local artist Chicken George is famous for his chicken head fence house on Hopkins Street — dozens of wooden rooster heads poking out between the white posts in the front yard.

And his art? Well, that involves collages made from coffee grounds, grocery stamps and cut-out words from 70s horror comic strips.

But there will be plenty of drumsticks to go around when he cooks them at his own artist’s reception from 5 to 8 p.m. Saturday at the Eyes of Texas Gallery in San Marcos.

“I don’t trust galleries, they screw up the food all the time,” Zupp said. “I used to do catering gigs, and I have all these recipes I want to try out. To me, when you have an artist’s reception, it’s like you’re hosting a party. I like to cook, so it doesn’t bother me (to cook at my own reception).”

Another thing that Chicken George likes is San Marcos. Though he’s based in San Antonio right now, a few weeks away from a master’s degree in sculpture from the University of Texas-San Antonio, he’s used a lot of what he remembers from his time in San Marcos as inspiration for this show.

“Most of the work in the show is based on old sculptures: I invent these smokers and houses and weird barns,” Zupp said. “There used to be tons of old buildings in the early 90s (in San Marcos), you could still see old houses and certain things that have since been removed. I guess it’s inevitable. But it really changes the character of San Marcos.”

That change he speaks of also motivated him to create rooster heads on the picket fence in his front yard. In 2001, amid controversy surrounding the proposed loop in San Marcos, Zupp thought it would be a good idea to put up the angry roosters. He called it a “psychological barrier.”

“I knew a lot of the ‘new’ people in San Marcos would try and domesticate it, and I didn’t like anything like that,” George said. “It was sort of a ‘Keep Austin Weird’ thing, only for San Marcos.”

Zupp started painting in high school, and by the time he became involved with the San Marcos art community, he found himself cooking. Zupp says that he’d cook at local receptions and cook at parties for friends. And he’s built up dozens of recipes along the way.

So which one — the food or the art — is more rewarding?

“A little bit of both,” Zupp said. “I make more art than I do food, plus I’m on a diet so I can’t really get too much into the cooking thing,” Zupp said. “When I have these events I can work to make the perfect dishes, but if I did that all the time I’d balloon up like a pig.”

And for anyone who loves his smoked chicken — or any neighbors waiting for those angry rooster heads to come down on Hopkins — Chicken George isn’t going anywhere after graduation.

“I’m definitely going to stick around San Marcos a lot, that’s my main base,” Zupp said. “A lot of artists come and go, but this is all I’ve got.”