Nero Statue, Middelkerke

Nero, the top-hatted dreamer of Marc Sleen's long-running Flemish strip, raises a hand with a grin near Middelkerke's casino, photographed in 2018. Jan Maillard's bronze went up in 1998 as only the second statue on the town's comic trail, a year after Jommeke opened it, which makes it a good introduction to Belgian strips that rarely travel abroad. Like its neighbors on the seafront, it was taken down for building works, and the town plans to regroup the figures in a new comic statue park beside Arthur Degreefplein.