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Turkish delights

Bruges’ international film fest looks at the reflective side of new cinema from Turkey
Tsilla Chelton has won awards for her deft portrayal of an old woman

Pieter Keereman has a simple answer when asked why Turkey is the focus of this year's Cinema Novo film festival, which starts this week in Bruges. "Turkish cinema is hot," the programmer says. "Turkish film directors receive a lot prizes. In the last edition of the Berlin Film Festival, the Golden Bear went to a Turkish movie."

It will be a while before that film, Honey by Semih Kaplanoglu, arrives on Belgian screens, but thanks to Cinema Novo we can see the director's previous film, Milk. This tells the story of a young man with ambitions to write poetry whose tenuous grip on reality is threatened by his imminent military service and the suggestion that his widowed mother may remarry.

Ian Mundell
(March 10, 2010)

“Softcore with a little soft gore”

Offscreen brings exploitation to a cinema near you
Revenge is sweet: Female Convict Scorpion

Exploitation films are usually low budget affairs, with acting and production values to match. But in the early 1970s, two Japanese studios decided to throw substantial amounts of money into making films that would previously have been beneath their dignity.

"In the 1970s, box office numbers were going down, with television coming up, so the studios decided to make pictures that would pull in audiences by showing things you couldn't show on the small screen," explains Micha Pletinckx of Marcel, one of the organisers behind the Offscreen Film Festival. A selection of these films is one of the highlights of this year's festival, which runs in Brussels over three weekends in March.

Ian Mundell
(March 3, 2010)

When “business” is a four-letter word

Ghent’s Kinky Star leads the way in making Ghent an alt music Mecca
Luc Waegeman

The Vlaasmarkt is a quiet central Ghent square by day but wakes up at 20.00 when the doors to Kinky Star Music Centre rattle open. The black painted interior is brightened up by the smiley, blond director, Luc Waegeman. On a band night, the crowd of relaxed, alternative Ghent dwellers spill out onto the street, creating an inviting atmosphere and reminding everyone that this is how music should be.

These Gentenaars have a certain aura about them, perhaps passed down from the time the mediaeval canal water was too infected to drink and all they consumed was beer, including the babies. Only the age limit has changed, and the pub has become Kinky Star.

(February 24, 2010)

The only way forward is back

Internationally renowned Koen van den Broek woos Belgium with two shows
Viaduct 2002

Koen van den Broek has risen to fame in the past 10 years, although he has attracted more attention abroad then in Belgium. Two exhibitions should readjust that. In Antwerp, you’ll find his works on paper and in Ghent’s museum of contemporary art, SMAK, are the paintings from the last decade that have made him famous.

Before even entering SMAK’s exhibition Curbs & Cracks, I was floored by a huge wall painting. It’s a first for the artist, and it’s by far his largest work ever, 8 x 12 metres. Although based on a pedestrian bridge in New York, it also looks like two looming skyscrapers, on the verge of collapsing.

Christophe Verbiest
(February 17, 2010)

The art of can’t

Disability and communication link forces at BRONKS

Every town should have a youth theatre. I have many happy memories of my parents taking me to childfriendly productions, and I believe such events go a long way towards giving children appreciation for different ways of thinking and a love of creative expression. Moreover, these shows often offer something for adults, as much as children.

Brussels seems to agree. BRONKS youth theatre was founded in 1991 and nearly one year ago moved into its own building. This week, I was thrilled to attend my first BRONKS performance, Niet kunnen is een kunst (Inability is an Art).

On the surface, the show is about disabilities. But Niet kunnen turns them on their head, asking: what if disabilities were really superpowers?

Sharon Light
(February 10, 2010)

Painting body and soul

An exquisite selection of works by Frida Kahlo comes to Brussels
“The Broken Column”, 1944

So many of the best-known works of iconic 20thcentury artists show no trace of the personal events that marked their lives. This isn’t the case with the oeuvres of Frida Kahlo, arguably Mexico’s most famous artistic, political and sexual revolutionary.

The largest collection of her work celebrates the bicentenary of Mexico’s independence and the centenary of its revolution at Bozar in Brussels. The 19 canvases, six drawings and one etching form a unique part of Frida Kahlo’s personal biography, in which she lays bare the most mentally and physically-taxing periods of her life.

In September of 1925, the 18-year-old Frida, studying to go to medical school, was seriously injured during a bus accident in Mexico City. Pierced by a pole, her pelvis, spine and right leg were shattered.

Saffina Rana
(February 3, 2010)

Cultural kick-start

deFilharmonie stages theatre concerts for children and young people

“It’s a bit like making a movie based on a book. It’s impossible to get everything from the book into the film. And it’s impossible to get everything from the music into the performance.”

In other words, making the right choices is key. Geert Riem is the programme manager for deFilharmonie, the Royal Flemish Philharmonic, and is explaining how they handle what sounds like quite a daunting task – arranging classical concerts for children.

The starting point for Baron von Münchhausen, the Philharmonic’s brand-new creation for children, is Joseph Haydn’s symphony no 83, La Poule. With that selection made, Riem and his artistic planning department, together with the conductor and author, then had to decide which excerpts to use and how to integrate a story.

Anna Jenkinson
(January 27, 2010)

Art + Sea = Ostend

Coastal resort is named as the very first “City of Culture”

Long known (and recently touted in these pages) as a city that attracts artists of all kinds, Ostend has been chosen as Flanders’ first-ever “City of Culture”. The title is the initiative of former culture minister Bert Anciaux, who chose Ostend to come first, followed by Turnhout in 2012. (On the in-between years, the Flemish Region will appoint a “City of Sport”.)

Aside from being virtually an artists’ colony for painters and writers staying either full or part time, Ostend hosts many cultural events that other cities of its size (69,000) and location (at the far end of the country) would hesitate to take on: an annual theatre festival, dance festival (pictured) and film festival. The city is partially able to support them because of summer tourist trade – but it’s also partly pride: a city that wants to keep its reputation as welcoming to artists had better offer them a cultural platform.

Lisa Bradshaw
(January 20, 2010)

Two women, two motorcycles, two great big continents

A Flemish couple publishes a book about the adventure of a lifetime

In 2007, Trui Hanoulle and Gaea Schoeters embarked on a great adventure – a journey across Turkey, Iran, Central Asia and the Arabic Peninsula. On motorcycles.

Facing extremes of both heat and cold and entering regions with less than stellar human rights reputations, the couple from Sint-Niklaas spent seven months crossing desolate landscapes, playing power games with border guards and enjoying more hospitality than they ever knew possible. Gaea, 33, is a journalist, and Trui, 49, is a photographer, so a book about the trek was inevitable. It’s called Meisjes, Moslims & Motoren (Girls, Muslims and Motorcycles).

Marlijke Maes
(January 13, 2010)

Et tu, Ambiorix?

The first-ever exhibition dedicated to the “Belgian” hero who defeated Caesar’s army
An idea of how Ambiorix probably looked; the curled sword of the “King of Oss”

In Tongeren, Ambiorix rules. The first century BC leader of the tribe called the Eburones, renowned for its staggering defeat of Caesar’s army, is believed to have lived in and around this area in what is now southern Limburg. The small city – Belgium’s oldest – shouts its ancient origins from the rooftops: there is the Ambi hotel, the Eburons Restaurant and the Julianus Shopping Centre (where “the customer is emperor!”).

A statue of Ambiorix by French sculptor Jules Bertin has been gracing Tongeren’s Grote Markt since 1866. Shirtless, his mass of muscles bulge forth as he gazes into the distance, his countenance both fierce and noble. Back at the Julianus, there is a permanent exhibition about the statue. Like Brussels’ much tinier mascot, Manneken Pis, Ambiorix is sometimes dressed in special costumes by the townspeople, and one can buy a souvenir Ambiorix statuette.

Lisa Bradshaw
(January 6, 2010)