We lack the words to properly describe what Cultures Maison means to us. But then again, there's no harm in trying. A preview of this year's seventh edition of the contemporary comics festival in all 26 letters of the alphabet.
© WREK
The ABC of a comics festival: Cultures Maison
ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE
Cultures Maison in one word? Passion. In several words: an infectious and irrepressible faith in the potential of comics, in the quality produced by meticulous attention to detail, and in the profundity and innovation that results from time, space, freedom, and exchange. The contemporary comics festival has notched up seven editions counting this one, and to a great extent that is thanks to the fact that it manifests this love and care resolutely, uncompromisingly, and with utter conviction.
BOOP, BETTY
Only one of the many characters from the catalogue of Max and Dave Fleischer, the pair of brothers whose invention of the rotoscope and karaoke helped them to turn Fleischer Studios into a formidable competitor to Disney. Between 1921 and 1942 they produced no fewer than 700 cartoons that not only featured Boop, but also characters like Koko the Clown, Popeye, and Superman. They are being brought back to life at Cultures Maison through a screening of their animated shorts.
CRAPULE
You only mean it when you say it twice. Crapule and Crapule are two distinct publications by two brothers, J. & E. LeGlatin, printed by two different publishers, Bicéphale and The Hoochie Coochie, and yet they both share the same apocalyptic, raw, and incomplete universe. Voracious readers with an ear for poetry and boundless faith in the narrative potential of comics, please report to ticket desk four.
DOUBLEBOB
The epitome of how a comic that rejects a linear plot and speech bubbles can become stunningly beautiful, intense visual poetry that very modestly but adeptly explodes off the page and gets under your skin for years to come. After the heart-rending, Escherian adieu of Sous-sols, DoubleBob has completed a new and addictive labyrinth that has been reworked into a solo show at Cultures Maison: Base-Zone.
EXCHANGE
Passions are there to be shared. With a round table, an info session, and a fair bustling with enthusiastic and experienced publishers as well as an audience that considers curiosity to be a virtue, Cultures Maison is consciously capitalising on the win-win of dialogue and exchange.
FAIREST OF THEM ALL
Tieten Met Haar! Hypnotisme! Cornélius! L'employé du Moi! La Crypte Tonique! Bicéphale! Bries! Les Requins Marteaux! Misma! Frémok! Cuistax! Berbolgru! Vite! Hélium! Adverse! With publishers like that, this is the fairest fair of them all.
GENEROSITY
Sharing is caring. By manifesting itself as an extremely dedicated, generous platform, oriented to supporting what it believes in so fervently, Cultures Maison has developed throughout the years into a network that resonates both nationally and internationally. All things of value are defenseless? Forget it! (See also: "Zero".)
You only mean it when you say it twice. Crapule and Crapule are two distinct publications by two brothers, J. & E. LeGlatin, printed by two different publishers, Bicéphale and The Hoochie Coochie, and yet they both share the same apocalyptic, raw, and incomplete universe. Voracious readers with an ear for poetry and boundless faith in the narrative potential of comics, please report to ticket desk four.
DOUBLEBOB
The epitome of how a comic that rejects a linear plot and speech bubbles can become stunningly beautiful, intense visual poetry that very modestly but adeptly explodes off the page and gets under your skin for years to come. After the heart-rending, Escherian adieu of Sous-sols, DoubleBob has completed a new and addictive labyrinth that has been reworked into a solo show at Cultures Maison: Base-Zone.
EXCHANGE
Passions are there to be shared. With a round table, an info session, and a fair bustling with enthusiastic and experienced publishers as well as an audience that considers curiosity to be a virtue, Cultures Maison is consciously capitalising on the win-win of dialogue and exchange.
FAIREST OF THEM ALL
Tieten Met Haar! Hypnotisme! Cornélius! L'employé du Moi! La Crypte Tonique! Bicéphale! Bries! Les Requins Marteaux! Misma! Frémok! Cuistax! Berbolgru! Vite! Hélium! Adverse! With publishers like that, this is the fairest fair of them all.
GENEROSITY
Sharing is caring. By manifesting itself as an extremely dedicated, generous platform, oriented to supporting what it believes in so fervently, Cultures Maison has developed throughout the years into a network that resonates both nationally and internationally. All things of value are defenseless? Forget it! (See also: "Zero".)
HOT IN HERRE
You could trust Nelly's advice and take off all your clothes, but trust us, that is not the way to bring down the temperature in the Maison des Cultures. Our advice: don't be stingy with the deodorant.
INNOVATION
Feeling nostalgic for the comics you read as a child? You'll do best to check that at the door of Cultures Maison. Art is a living, dynamic force and, apart from some pubescent fantasies and dark fetishes, comics have grown up. And that is in no small way thanks to the efforts of publishers and comics artists like those at Cultures Maison, who have been pushing their work to the avant-garde of the comics medium.
JUST DO IT
Yes, Cultures Maison is founded on serious principles, but it is also just a seriously fun house. Cooler than Vanilla Ice, and hotter than Burning Man. Fair enough, our frame of reference is perhaps slightly outdated, but who are you to judge? We won't, so just come over and give it a try!
KILL YOUR DARLINGS
With a fair bursting at the seams with unique stallholders flaunting their delicious fare (see: "Fairest of them all") – wares that you don't often see together under one roof in Brussels – and a budget bound to certain constraints, to choose is inevitably also to lose.
LOVE FOR STORIES
Beyond the "once upon a times" and "in a world far, far aways" of tales you may know, there are also opening lines that out of love for the comics medium, books, publishing, drawing, and storytelling offer slightly more subtlety and complexity. And it is no coincidence that this love is shared by all the people who are trying to get your attention at Cultures Maison.
MANUEL
¿Qué? Who is the figure hidden behind the great Manuel? We know nothing! Or perhaps we do: in essence, a drawing is a set of lines. Behold your vocabulary and syntax. Now play! Cultures Maison is organising an exhibition about the comics artist who turned geometry into an artisanal craft en likes to keep things as one-dimensional as possible. Ecstatically entertaining.
NICHES
To one person, an insult that brooks no dissent, to the other a glorious destination where people can still search for meaning, stubbornly, willfully, and longingly. These so-called niches usually gain notoriety by spreading the germ through word of mouth, which can sometimes lead to incurable infections.
ONE STEP BEYOND
Any repeat trespasser can go a long way with passion, dedication, and depth. And this civil disobedience is indispensable if you want to continue to breath new life into comics.
PUBLISHERS
Without a single exception, the figures here will move heaven and earth to make the stars that they believe in shine as brightly as possible. And who through this steadfast belief are willing to take risks, create time and space, make discoveries, and be astounded. And for all these reasons, they are justly embraced and pampered by Cultures Maison.
QUALITY LABEL
It is entirely to their own credit that Cultures Maison has become a hallmark in the field of contemporary comics over the past few years.
RABBITS
It is a mystery to us why this year's musical act consists of a pair of enormous carrots. But the fact that the multi-instrumentalists of Music for Rabbits were plucked from Zappa's garden is already making our mouth water.
¿Qué? Who is the figure hidden behind the great Manuel? We know nothing! Or perhaps we do: in essence, a drawing is a set of lines. Behold your vocabulary and syntax. Now play! Cultures Maison is organising an exhibition about the comics artist who turned geometry into an artisanal craft en likes to keep things as one-dimensional as possible. Ecstatically entertaining.
NICHES
To one person, an insult that brooks no dissent, to the other a glorious destination where people can still search for meaning, stubbornly, willfully, and longingly. These so-called niches usually gain notoriety by spreading the germ through word of mouth, which can sometimes lead to incurable infections.
ONE STEP BEYOND
Any repeat trespasser can go a long way with passion, dedication, and depth. And this civil disobedience is indispensable if you want to continue to breath new life into comics.
PUBLISHERS
Without a single exception, the figures here will move heaven and earth to make the stars that they believe in shine as brightly as possible. And who through this steadfast belief are willing to take risks, create time and space, make discoveries, and be astounded. And for all these reasons, they are justly embraced and pampered by Cultures Maison.
QUALITY LABEL
It is entirely to their own credit that Cultures Maison has become a hallmark in the field of contemporary comics over the past few years.
RABBITS
It is a mystery to us why this year's musical act consists of a pair of enormous carrots. But the fact that the multi-instrumentalists of Music for Rabbits were plucked from Zappa's garden is already making our mouth water.
SAUVAGE
Before your head runs away with ideas about "girls gone wild" or other prosaic subcategories, we have to tell you that the subtitle of Brussels-based Thomas Gilbert's new work is "ou la sagesse des pierres". So it is a touch more poetic, but no less raw and brutal. A wallop from Mother Nature that you can enjoy in exhibition form.
TOMORROW NEVER DIES
Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat zwei, the Germans say. We say: Alles hat ein Ende, but Cultures Maison will never die. We're free to dream, right?
UNEXPECTED
A direct result of that "One Step Beyond". Expect the unexpected, prepare to make some discoveries.
Before your head runs away with ideas about "girls gone wild" or other prosaic subcategories, we have to tell you that the subtitle of Brussels-based Thomas Gilbert's new work is "ou la sagesse des pierres". So it is a touch more poetic, but no less raw and brutal. A wallop from Mother Nature that you can enjoy in exhibition form.
TOMORROW NEVER DIES
Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat zwei, the Germans say. We say: Alles hat ein Ende, but Cultures Maison will never die. We're free to dream, right?
UNEXPECTED
A direct result of that "One Step Beyond". Expect the unexpected, prepare to make some discoveries.
VARLEZ, ROBERT
Publisher (Atelier de l'agneau) and illustrator who in the 1970s started experimenting in the comic strip laboratory, and who was recently rescued from obscurity by The Hoochie Coochie. With the hypnotising, subtle, and rich patchwork of Suit(es), the subject of an exhibition at Cultures Maison, Varlez explores the boundaries of the comic strip, the collage, and the visual arts.
WREK
The affable team that operates under the banner WREK – the result of a wordplay on the German word Werk, "work" – playfully occupy themselves by using 50 shades of black to abuse the comics medium, in an effort to keep it raw and vital. In other words: if it ain't broke, wrek it. Olivier Deprez, Miles O'Shea, and Marine Penhouët are landing at Cultures Maison with a veritable love boat.
X-MEN
Characters that you will search for in vain in the books presented here. Try "XXX-Men" – they're filthy buggers, those "underground" comic book artists.
YOU
Cultures Maison is a welcome breath of fresh air in an increasingly market-driven world that approaches readers with algorithms and thinks it can predict what they will want. Here you will get respect for the whimsical, creative creature that you are. The fact that you will be challenged and confronted with the dark sides of what you like to read is not a barrier, but rather the cause of your faithfulness and enduring return.
ZERO
What all of this is going to cost you, as well as what it costs the stallholders. For love of the game, and a passion for comics.
Cultures Maison, 9 > 11/9, Maison des Cultures de Saint Gilles, Belgradostraat/Rue de Belgrade 120, 1060 Sint-Gillis/Saint-Gilles
Publisher (Atelier de l'agneau) and illustrator who in the 1970s started experimenting in the comic strip laboratory, and who was recently rescued from obscurity by The Hoochie Coochie. With the hypnotising, subtle, and rich patchwork of Suit(es), the subject of an exhibition at Cultures Maison, Varlez explores the boundaries of the comic strip, the collage, and the visual arts.
WREK
The affable team that operates under the banner WREK – the result of a wordplay on the German word Werk, "work" – playfully occupy themselves by using 50 shades of black to abuse the comics medium, in an effort to keep it raw and vital. In other words: if it ain't broke, wrek it. Olivier Deprez, Miles O'Shea, and Marine Penhouët are landing at Cultures Maison with a veritable love boat.
X-MEN
Characters that you will search for in vain in the books presented here. Try "XXX-Men" – they're filthy buggers, those "underground" comic book artists.
YOU
Cultures Maison is a welcome breath of fresh air in an increasingly market-driven world that approaches readers with algorithms and thinks it can predict what they will want. Here you will get respect for the whimsical, creative creature that you are. The fact that you will be challenged and confronted with the dark sides of what you like to read is not a barrier, but rather the cause of your faithfulness and enduring return.
ZERO
What all of this is going to cost you, as well as what it costs the stallholders. For love of the game, and a passion for comics.
Cultures Maison, 9 > 11/9, Maison des Cultures de Saint Gilles, Belgradostraat/Rue de Belgrade 120, 1060 Sint-Gillis/Saint-Gilles
Lees meer over: Events & Festivals, Expo
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