Latest / WIXN AM 1460 - Shaw Local Radio / Talk Line 10-06-2026: Nora Reuter dishes on Rock River inspired mural
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Welcome back, Sock Valley.
- 0:02Speaker 2: You're with The Waking Crew here on FM 95.1 and
- 0:05Speaker 2: AM 1460 WIXN. 8.15 on your Tuesday morning. Thank you
- 0:11Speaker 2: for tuning in and listening. And I'm joined in the
- 0:14Speaker 2: booth once again by my good friend, local artist and
- 0:18Speaker 2: celebrity in her own right. Well, if you know a
- 0:22Speaker 2: paintbrush or look up at anything that's got anything artsy
- 0:25Speaker 2: to do with it, It's usually got your name on
- 0:27Speaker 2: it or at least your touch to it. Nora Reuter
- 0:29Speaker 2: joining me in the studio today.
- 0:31Speaker 1: Nora, how are you?
- 0:32Speaker 3: Wow, Brandon, that was quite an intro. I'm glad these
- 0:37Speaker 3: people can't see how red my face is right now.
- 0:40Speaker 3: That's nice. I'm doing good. I'm really happy to be here.
- 0:43Speaker 3: Thanks for having me this morning.
- 0:44Speaker 2: Yeah, I didn't have the camera up, so you're welcome,
- 0:46Speaker 2: but they don't get to see that cool shirt, so
- 0:49Speaker 2: that's kind of the... The boo to them, but we'll
- 0:51Speaker 2: share that story for another time. You're here giving my
- 0:55Speaker 2: listeners a very special kind of announcement update.
- 1:01Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll call it that.
- 1:02Speaker 4: So as many people know, I've been working very hard
- 1:05Speaker 4: this summer on a very important just passion project of
- 1:09Speaker 4: mine that has been years in the making. So if
- 1:12Speaker 4: you've driven by the water department all this summer, you've
- 1:14Speaker 4: probably seen it or me working out there. So- It's
- 1:19Speaker 4: a hundred foot long, right across from the Rock River,
- 1:23Speaker 4: right on River Road. A giant, the title of the
- 1:26Speaker 4: mural is called Reflections of the Rock. It's meant to
- 1:30Speaker 4: visually and conceptually reflect the Rock River. So I've been
- 1:34Speaker 4: working really hard on it and I'm here to kind
- 1:36Speaker 4: of let everybody know that I'm going to be done soon.
- 1:39Speaker 4: And then I invite them to come out to the
- 1:41Speaker 4: mural reveal, which is going to be next Wednesday, October
- 1:43Speaker 4: 14th at 10 a.m., Join me, friends, family, the city.
- 1:49Speaker 4: I'm going to be able to talk about the project itself,
- 1:52Speaker 4: what the purpose of it was, a couple inside things,
- 1:55Speaker 4: and just be there to answer any questions and just
- 1:57Speaker 4: share it with everybody.
- 1:58Speaker 3: So I'm really excited to do that.
- 2:00Speaker 1: Now, how long have you been working on this?
- 2:02Speaker 4: I anticipated you asking me that last night. So I
- 2:06Speaker 4: kind of went back into my calendar and did some
- 2:09Speaker 4: rough adding up, and I think I'm almost to about
- 2:11Speaker 4: 350 hours.
- 2:12Speaker 3: Holy cow.
- 2:13Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 2:14Speaker 3: Wow. Yeah.
- 2:15Speaker 4: But like I said, you know, like I said, I've
- 2:19Speaker 4: been wanting to have this done for a few years.
- 2:21Speaker 4: So when I started the mural, I had a general
- 2:24Speaker 4: idea of what I wanted to do, but it really
- 2:26Speaker 4: took shape as I kept working on it. And, you know,
- 2:30Speaker 4: Salvador Dali has a great quote. He says, no art
- 2:33Speaker 4: is ever finished.
- 2:34Speaker 3: It's merely abandoned. So that's how I feel about this.
- 2:37Speaker 1: I could keep working.
- 2:38Speaker 3: On this thing for a year and add more, more, more, more, more.
- 2:42Speaker 4: But I feel I'm at a good place to share
- 2:45Speaker 4: it with everybody. So, yeah, I'm really excited to do that.
- 2:49Speaker 2: Now, when you say share it with everybody, are you
- 2:51Speaker 2: still literally putting final touches or is it?
- 2:54Speaker 4: Yeah, so the calendar goes like this. The rest of
- 2:57Speaker 4: this week, I'm going to be adding more mammals, more reptiles,
- 3:02Speaker 4: more birds. I already have fish, lots of other creatures
- 3:06Speaker 4: so far. And then next week, Monday, I'm going to
- 3:09Speaker 4: be open at Braveheart's Creative Studio for Columbus Day because
- 3:12Speaker 4: a lot of the kids have off and a lot
- 3:13Speaker 4: of parents don't. So I'll be open Monday, and then
- 3:15Speaker 4: Tuesday I'm going to go back, paint all the frames.
- 3:18Speaker 4: Wednesday we'll have our reveal, and then I'm going to
- 3:21Speaker 4: wait a couple days until Friday where it's nice and cured,
- 3:23Speaker 4: and then I'm going to do an official sealant on there.
- 3:26Speaker 4: So it's good to go for a long, long time.
- 3:29Speaker 2: Now when it came to the inspiration for this, what
- 3:33Speaker 2: were some of the things you were drawing on?
- 3:35Speaker 3: Great question. I've always been a dirty outdoor kid. I
- 3:40Speaker 3: love fishing. I love nature. I love the Midwest. I
- 3:44Speaker 3: love living here. I was born here in Dixon, but
- 3:48Speaker 3: I grew up in Georgia for a little while as
- 3:49Speaker 3: a kid.
- 3:50Speaker 4: And coming back to this area, I am a Midwesterner,
- 3:54Speaker 4: and I truly do love this area. So a lot
- 3:57Speaker 4: of it has to do with that, but a lot
- 3:58Speaker 4: of it also has to do with not just making
- 4:00Speaker 4: something pretty, but I wanted to involve the community, right?
- 4:03Speaker 3: So I want to have.
- 4:04Speaker 4: teachers be able to take their kids down there and
- 4:06Speaker 4: identify what fish is what and and you know have
- 4:10Speaker 4: that educational value to it also for tourists they can
- 4:13Speaker 4: come in and go oh i didn't know that that
- 4:15Speaker 4: was a native fish here i didn't know that was
- 4:16Speaker 4: a native bird here um and then they can go
- 4:19Speaker 4: out and explore our area and look for those things
- 4:21Speaker 4: too so it's kind of interactive in that way it
- 4:24Speaker 4: kind of pulls some of the community in i also
- 4:26Speaker 4: asked some of the community to uh to send me
- 4:28Speaker 4: some photo references and that they had made take, maybe
- 4:31Speaker 4: have taken on the Rock River themselves. So there's a
- 4:34Speaker 4: little bit of their heart in there too. I just
- 4:36Speaker 4: really tried to be all encompassing. So it's not just
- 4:38Speaker 4: me making something that I like. It's really something that I'm,
- 4:42Speaker 4: it was made to share, you know, and I'm so
- 4:44Speaker 4: excited to share it.
- 4:46Speaker 2: And, you know, you said, you've mentioned that this has
- 4:48Speaker 2: been something that you've wanted to do. What was kind
- 4:52Speaker 2: of like the beginning, you know, ideas of wanting to do?
- 4:56Speaker 2: And did it kind of, In the beginning, did it
- 4:59Speaker 2: match up with where you ended up now or kind
- 5:02Speaker 2: of how did that evolve over time? And then how
- 5:04Speaker 2: did it actually get to the point where you were
- 5:07Speaker 2: able to do this?
- 5:09Speaker 4: You know, sometimes there's really no one way to do it.
- 5:12Speaker 4: Anybody who's an artist and, you know, you know this too.
- 5:15Speaker 3: Inspiration comes from anywhere.
- 5:17Speaker 4: And sometimes I'll look at a wall and think of
- 5:18Speaker 4: an idea and then sometimes I'll have an idea and
- 5:20Speaker 4: look for a wall.
- 5:22Speaker 3: This one, you know, I saw this.
- 5:24Speaker 4: Wall years and years and years ago when I was,
- 5:27Speaker 4: you know, just kind of starting out painting murals. And
- 5:30Speaker 4: then I saw the river immediately and it just stuck.
- 5:33Speaker 4: Like I never had another idea for this wall. Like
- 5:35Speaker 4: I've always wanted to go this route.
- 5:37Speaker 3: Especially the nature scene. I love painting fish, birds, reptiles.
- 5:42Speaker 4: You know, I got skunks, pelicans, bald eagles in there.
- 5:45Speaker 4: I love painting stuff like that. So selfishly, I wanted
- 5:47Speaker 4: to paint some stuff that I like to paint and
- 5:50Speaker 4: also test myself. I've never worked harder on something. This
- 5:53Speaker 4: isn't my largest mural, but it is definitely something I've
- 5:56Speaker 4: I've never worked harder anywhere. And I'm so proud to
- 5:59Speaker 4: have that one here in my hometown because I have
- 6:02Speaker 4: hundreds all over Chicago area, southern Illinois, northern Illinois.
- 6:06Speaker 3: I mean, you know, this this has.
- 6:09Speaker 4: Been such an amazing thing. So it came into place
- 6:12Speaker 4: through the the Arts Coalition we have here in Dixon
- 6:15Speaker 4: and Dixon put out a bid. to, uh, have the
- 6:17Speaker 4: mural painted. And I think I didn't see any other ones,
- 6:20Speaker 4: but I hear they were really great. And I'm hoping
- 6:22Speaker 4: we can get some of those in some other areas.
- 6:25Speaker 3: Um, you know, I tell.
- 6:26Speaker 4: Everybody this, when you have somebody come over to your house,
- 6:29Speaker 4: what do you typically do? You know, you clean up,
- 6:31Speaker 4: you tidy up, you want people to think that you
- 6:33Speaker 4: appreciate your home, that you respect your home. It's kind
- 6:36Speaker 4: of the same thing with murals. When people come into
- 6:38Speaker 4: a community and they see fresh, you know, public art,
- 6:42Speaker 4: clean streets.
- 6:43Speaker 3: Things like that, they can tell that we care.
- 6:45Speaker 4: They can tell that we respect our place and they
- 6:47Speaker 4: feel safer too.
- 6:48Speaker 3: So this isn't.
- 6:49Speaker 4: Just like a, let's make things look pretty. It really
- 6:52Speaker 4: resonates with people who live here as well as people
- 6:55Speaker 4: who come through. We like having a nice reputation, you
- 6:58Speaker 4: know what I mean? And I like contributing to that too.
- 7:01Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 7:01Speaker 3: Yeah.
- 7:01Speaker 2: And, you know, making it look nice, you're absolutely right.
- 7:05Speaker 2: I mean, it's not just a pseudoscience as it will.
- 7:09Speaker 2: They actually, you know, have done studies on this where
- 7:12Speaker 2: I mean, the nicer an area looks, the more, just
- 7:17Speaker 2: as a secondary effect, the nicer people take care of it.
- 7:20Speaker 2: There's a sense of pride. Whereas, you know, on the
- 7:23Speaker 2: flip side, you break a window on a building and
- 7:27Speaker 2: you leave it there. Maybe nothing happens after a week,
- 7:29Speaker 2: but after a month, you start to see more litter
- 7:31Speaker 2: on the street. You start to see broken cars, graffiti
- 7:34Speaker 2: on the building that was hit.
- 7:36Speaker 4: Why?
- 7:36Speaker 1: There's this.
- 7:37Speaker 2: There's this thing that hits with people that are like, oh,
- 7:40Speaker 2: this is junk. We don't care about this. This is
- 7:42Speaker 2: the bad end of town now, right? Nothing really actually
- 7:46Speaker 2: happened to the bad end of it. But because you
- 7:51Speaker 2: could visually see nobody cared about it anymore, everybody else
- 7:54Speaker 2: stops caring about it. And so it is the exact opposite.
- 7:58Speaker 2: When you care about it, when you show, when you
- 8:00Speaker 2: put the effort into it, And you go above people
- 8:03Speaker 2: treat it that way.
- 8:03Speaker 1: Yes.
- 8:04Speaker 4: And I think, you know, my friend Dayona asked me
- 8:06Speaker 4: a question yesterday. She said, what do you think makes
- 8:08Speaker 4: Dixon great?
- 8:08Speaker 3: And I said, people.
- 8:10Speaker 4: The people who I have seen continuously step up. I'm
- 8:13Speaker 4: going to plug my husband, Brent Reuter, there for a second.
- 8:16Speaker 4: But people like him, you know, Jennifer Lang, Amanda and
- 8:19Speaker 4: all of them at Discover Dixon. There's so many people
- 8:23Speaker 4: that are in new leadership roles, I feel, in our
- 8:25Speaker 4: community that are really making some amazing things happen. I'm
- 8:28Speaker 4: excited to raise my son here. You know, and you'd
- 8:31Speaker 4: ask me in my 20s if I'd ever moved back
- 8:32Speaker 4: to Dixon, I would have laughed at you.
- 8:34Speaker 1: Sure.
- 8:35Speaker 2: And I think that's the way so many people feel
- 8:37Speaker 2: when they're younger.
- 8:38Speaker 3: I truly love this community.
- 8:39Speaker 4: And when you, you know, like I said, when you
- 8:41Speaker 4: love something, you take care of it.
- 8:42Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 8:42Speaker 4: And there's so many people that volunteer downtown, cleaning up
- 8:46Speaker 4: our riverfront. You know, I love doing anything I can
- 8:49Speaker 4: to be a part of that and be a part
- 8:51Speaker 4: of that reputation.
- 8:51Speaker 3: I know you do, too.
- 8:53Speaker 4: So it's cool to kind of rally up and inspire people, too,
- 8:56Speaker 4: in that way.
- 8:57Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 8:57Speaker 4: And show our young people too that like, you know,
- 9:00Speaker 4: we do live in a self-serving society where if it
- 9:04Speaker 4: doesn't serve me, it's.
- 9:05Speaker 3: Not worth it.
- 9:06Speaker 4: But if my one, if I could give any advice
- 9:09Speaker 4: to our young people, it's like the more you kind
- 9:11Speaker 4: of create an impact for the people around you, the
- 9:13Speaker 4: more you will feel better.
- 9:14Speaker 3: Yeah.
- 9:15Speaker 4: You know, I seriously think self-serving leads to depression and
- 9:18Speaker 4: things like that. Like when you serve people, maybe it's
- 9:20Speaker 4: the Lord, maybe it's the community, maybe it's your school,
- 9:24Speaker 4: whatever it may be.
- 9:26Speaker 3: I didn't think this conversation was.
- 9:27Speaker 4: Going to turn into this, but you know what I'm
- 9:31Speaker 4: getting at. I think the more we put into the
- 9:33Speaker 4: things that we love around us and the people that
- 9:36Speaker 4: we love and the community that we love, it does
- 9:38Speaker 4: come back full force.
- 9:40Speaker 2: You are absolutely right, and it's one of the first
- 9:42Speaker 2: things that I had noticed about you and Brent when
- 9:45Speaker 2: I first met you guys years back when it came
- 9:48Speaker 2: to actually having.
- 9:49Speaker 1: To do with this golf.
- 9:51Speaker 2: You guys have always been building in terms of community
- 9:54Speaker 2: and giving back in terms of community.
- 9:56Speaker 1: That was a hot drink and you took that down
- 9:58Speaker 1: like a champ.
- 10:00Speaker 2: No noise or nothing she just let it burn down
- 10:02Speaker 2: those vocal cords but uh me calling you out this
- 10:07Speaker 2: morning but no um i mean seriously you're absolutely right
- 10:10Speaker 2: i can tell i mean you like you said you
- 10:13Speaker 2: love outdoors you guys both love disc golf um i
- 10:17Speaker 2: think you i i You wanted to build more and
- 10:20Speaker 2: see more with that, and it's become a community effect.
- 10:24Speaker 2: And what it's given back to folks, it's the same
- 10:27Speaker 2: kind of concept. And I think it's just beautiful because
- 10:30Speaker 2: I can see the passion that comes out of you
- 10:33Speaker 2: when you talk about this. It was the same when
- 10:34Speaker 2: I talked with you and him back when it was
- 10:37Speaker 2: disc golf. It's no surprise that it's the same in
- 10:39Speaker 2: your art. And I just think that it's so cool
- 10:43Speaker 2: that you found a way to give back while it
- 10:46Speaker 2: gives to you at the same time.
- 10:47Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
- 10:48Speaker 1: Absolutely.
- 10:49Speaker 4: Yeah, Brent's been working really, really, really hard on getting
- 10:53Speaker 4: Page Park back open, which we're hoping to have a,
- 10:56Speaker 4: this is unofficial, I hope he's not mad at me
- 10:58Speaker 4: for saying this, but we're thinking October 30th, do a
- 11:01Speaker 4: little Friday thing. Official grand opening. Give some giveaways. Maybe
- 11:07Speaker 4: even a little glow tournament that night.
- 11:08Speaker 3: We haven't done anything official.
- 11:09Speaker 4: They can follow Rock River Disc Golf on Facebook for
- 11:12Speaker 4: any updates on that. But we're really hoping to get
- 11:15Speaker 4: that open soon. We've really been missing out on that.
- 11:18Speaker 4: With that course gone, we did lose a little bit
- 11:19Speaker 4: of disc golf community. So we're excited to get that
- 11:22Speaker 4: back up and running.
- 11:23Speaker 2: It'll get back up. Thankfully, we're talking long game here. So, no,
- 11:29Speaker 2: I absolutely love it.
- 11:30Speaker 1: This is great.
- 11:31Speaker 2: You know, I got to ask, and maybe this is
- 11:33Speaker 2: a weird stack question, but if you had to say
- 11:37Speaker 2: how many gallons of paint has went into this mural?
- 11:40Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. You had to imagine, like, is he going
- 11:42Speaker 1: to ask that question?
- 11:44Speaker 3: You know what, Brandon?
- 11:44Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 11:45Speaker 4: Um, let me tell you something about artists where there's
- 11:47Speaker 4: two sides of the brain, right? Uh, you're talking about
- 11:51Speaker 4: a question that involves a lot of numbers. I, I
- 11:53Speaker 4: don't even know how I could estimate that too. You know, uh,
- 11:58Speaker 4: how much paint have I used on this mural?
- 11:59Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 12:01Speaker 4: Roughly.
- 12:02Speaker 3: Roughly. Um, you know, it's not, it'd probably be less
- 12:08Speaker 3: than you'd think.
- 12:09Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 12:09Speaker 3: I'd probably probably about seven gallons. Okay. Not really that much.
- 12:14Speaker 2: Okay.
- 12:14Speaker 3: The sealer included were probably closer to 10.
- 12:17Speaker 4: Okay.
- 12:18Speaker 2: But.
- 12:19Speaker 3: All right. Yeah.
- 12:20Speaker 4: Yeah.
- 12:20Speaker 2: Well, when you think in terms of space, honestly, if
- 12:23Speaker 2: you were to. Just paint a wall, it probably wouldn't
- 12:26Speaker 2: be that much. So that makes sense.
- 12:28Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 12:28Speaker 2: But I had to ask. My brain was just sitting there.
- 12:31Speaker 2: I think I was way too much in energy mode.
- 12:33Speaker 1: I don't do math.
- 12:35Speaker 3: I don't do math in general, let alone at 8
- 12:36Speaker 3: in the morning.
- 12:37Speaker 2: Are you kidding me with that gulp you took down?
- 12:40Speaker 2: I thought you were just going to pop out like 6.42 gallons, Brennan.
- 12:44Speaker 4: That gulp did nothing but burn my tongue.
- 12:45Speaker 3: It didn't wake me up at all. Oh, God.
- 12:50Speaker 1: Anything else we should know about this, Nora?
- 12:53Speaker 4: If you're not already following me, Instagram, Facebook, at Nora
- 12:58Speaker 4: Kate Paints.
- 13:00Speaker 3: I have a new website I just launched.
- 13:01Speaker 4: It's not fully done yet, so don't be too harsh,
- 13:04Speaker 4: but www.norakatepaints.com. I'm posting every day of little time lapses
- 13:11Speaker 4: of different.
- 13:12Speaker 3: Creatures and things like that.
- 13:13Speaker 4: Yesterday I did a little raccoon and two babies and.
- 13:16Speaker 3: Um, it was a lot of fun.
- 13:17Speaker 4: So I'm, I'm excited to see everybody that sees it
- 13:20Speaker 4: kind of not in real time, but pretty close to.
- 13:22Speaker 4: So if you want to catch up, you want to
- 13:23Speaker 4: see it, you want to learn more about it. That's
- 13:25Speaker 4: where you can go to it. And I hope to
- 13:26Speaker 4: see everybody next Wednesday, October 14th at 10 AM at
- 13:31Speaker 4: the water department on river.
- 13:32Speaker 3: Road here in Dixon. Thank you so much, Brandon. I
- 13:34Speaker 3: really appreciate it.
- 13:35Speaker 2: Hey, love putting it out. You're doing the good work.
- 13:38Speaker 2: I just get to sit here and let you talk
- 13:40Speaker 2: about it. And then you tell me thank you, and
- 13:42Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, yes.
- 13:42Speaker 4: Yeah, but I mean, like, you know, you're a good friend,
- 13:46Speaker 4: and I can text you and go, hey, I want
- 13:48Speaker 4: to promote this.
- 13:49Speaker 3: Because, like I said, I want to share it. So
- 13:52Speaker 3: I want people to be there.
- 13:53Speaker 2: No, this is awesome for the community, and I thank
- 13:56Speaker 2: you for doing the work. And I can't think of
- 13:58Speaker 2: anybody better to have been heading a project like this.
- 14:01Speaker 2: So I just love to see it, and I can't
- 14:03Speaker 2: wait to see where the future goes.
- 14:05Speaker 1: This won't be the last.
- 14:06Speaker 3: Time you're in my studio.
- 14:06Speaker 4: I'm hoping to get a lot more murals in town,
- 14:08Speaker 4: not painted by me necessarily, just a lot more. I
- 14:12Speaker 4: want to promote some younger artists and some other artists
- 14:14Speaker 4: who maybe haven't taken it that far, but I'm excited
- 14:17Speaker 4: for the future of Dixon in general.
- 14:19Speaker 1: Yeah, I'd like to see murals over every building.
- 14:22Speaker 2: Seriously, I'd love the town to be transformed into a
- 14:25Speaker 2: work of art on top of everything else.
- 14:26Speaker 3: We need some color. No more millennial gray. Get this
- 14:29Speaker 3: stuff out of here.
- 14:30Speaker 1: Thank you. Just our opinions.
- 14:32Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure.
- 14:34Speaker 1: Thanks, Nora.