People who park at Naperville’s largest garage will now walk past colorful murals painted by students from five area high schools as student-recorded performances of their fight songs play.
Some of those students, along with the project’s art director and other local officials, unveiled the completed “Naperville High School Way-Finding Murals” at a ribbon-cutting event Sunday.
“They tell the Naperville story by kids of today,” said Brand Bobosky, president of the Century Walk Corp., a public art nonprofit. “Only in Naperville!”
He extolled the virtues of public art, noting that the city is adorned with $4.5 million of it, about half funded by private donations. “It’s permanent, and it’s free,” he said.
The project started 13 years ago under the guidance of local muralist Timm Etters, who died in 2021 from COVID-19 while also fighting cancer. Artist Dodie Mondero oversaw the completion of the murals, helping students from Meta Valley and Neuqua Valley high schools paint the first and second floors.
“It’s been such an honor to represent and finish up what Timm Etters started,” Mondero said.
The upper floors feature work from Naperville Central, Naperville North and Waubonsie Valley student artists, representing the “school spirit” of each high school.
“Their artwork will be here as long as the parking garage is here,” said Nina Menis, executive director of KidsMatter, a youth nonprofit that also participated in the project.
The art includes school mascots, historical scenes of Naperville, and other themes and values important to the students.
“‘Wayfinding’ is what we do in high school — we find our way,” Naperville Mayor Scott Wehrli said.
Wehrli noted the event, which took place on an immaculate spring day, marked his first official ribbon cutting as mayor.
“What would Naperville be like without public art and the work Century Walk has done over the years?” he said.
Metea Valley junior Ashley Gaziano and senior Killian Johnson stood by their finished mural Sunday explaining their inspiration for it. They aimed to communicate how students build relationships in school, which in their case meant making art together, they said.
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The work features teens designing and painting a mural of mascot Marty the Mustang. The real-life students first sketched it out then painted over a projector-displayed image of it on the wall. It took two full days.
“It’s really cool,” Johnson said, pointing at the other names on the walls. “These are our friends. We know these people.”
Giles Bruce is a freelance reporter for the Naperville Sun.