In second place came another favourite of the public, the Bulgarian Evgeni Bozhanov, followed by the Dutchman Hannes Minnaar. The second Russian in the finals, Yuri Favorin, was ranked fourth, ahead of two of the five South Koreans in the finals, Kim Tae-Hyung and Kim Da Sol. The other six finalists, as is customary, were not ranked.

Meanwhile, the Canvascollectie for 2010, for the first time a joint venture between Flemish TV station Canvas and French-speaking TV station RTBF, was won by Patrick Mascaux and Christine Wilmes for their landscape photo “Distant Paradise”. The public prize went to Eric De Ville from Brussels for his photo series La tour de Bruxelles en Automne/La tour de Bruxelles by night, in which city facades are reconstructed into a Tower of Babel, based on the 15th-century painting by Hieronymus Bosch.

The KBC prize for the most promising young Flemish artist went to the Brussels-based Elly Van Eeghem, who won for her video “Toren” (pictured), in which she builds a tower of books.

Later this week, on 5 June, Flemish dance pioneer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker’s P.A.R.T.S. (Performing Arts Research and Training Studios) will be awarded the first-ever Silver Lion for dance at the Venice Biennale. The prize is intended to recognise young talent. The biennale said that P.A.R.T.S., which was founded in 1995, represents “a complete and intensive programme of studies in which the most advanced techniques of contemporary dance dialogue with other artistic disciplines”.