Century Walk artists find home in Downtown Naperville
For more than a year, Dick Tracy has kept an eye on the Riverwalk from the statue's perch near Water Street. During that time, Naperville Police Chief David Dial said the city had the lowest crime rate in history.
Tracy's presence will now also be felt inside the Naperville Township Administration Building at 139 Water St, at least for the time being.
Tracy and the works of Naperville artist Dick Locher will first occupy the new Century Walk Artist exhibit in the administration building.
“We've had an idea for a while to get some place where we could display works by our artists and this has now come to fruition with some help from the city,” Century Walk Chairman Brand Bobosky said. “This would be a nice lace for public art. We've got to do good or we'll have to take our pictures and find some other place. But we think we will do good.”
Though the Locher and Tracy display, featuring framed displays of several of Locher's comic strips including his last strip on March 13, is set up to look permanent, Bobosky said he hopes to be able to rotate in displays by each of the artists that have contributed to Century Walk.
Locher, recently retired, said he was honored to be the first artist exhibited.
“Mary and I are very proud to be Napervillians. This is a great honor,” Locher said. (Drawing Dick Tracy) has been a labor of love for me. I've spent 32 years helping draw Dick Tracy. It's the fifth oldest comic strip in America today.”
The exhibit will be open from 1 to 4 p.m. every Sunday. Naper Settlement will also host a party celebrating the comic strip's 80th anniversary from 12:30 to 4 p.m. Sunday.