Keepcalmandfilmon - Thursday 7 July 2016

#400
Erkenningsnummer P708816
OCTOBER 7, 2015 \ nEwswEEkly - € 0,75 \ rEad morE at www.flandErstoday.Eu
currEnt affairs \ P2
Politics \ P4
Migration &
investMent
Flanders’ minister-president
delivers annual September
Declaration, emphasising
migration challenges
and new investments
\4
BusinEss \ P6
science
stand-up
innovation \ P7
You might think scientists
are long on brains and
short on humour, but the
Bright Club comedy night
says otherwise
\7
Education \ P9
art & living \ P10
Beautiful
Beanies
The founder of LN Beanies
handmade knitwear has opened
her own shop and provided 300
women in Peru with fairwage jobs
\ 10
Keep calm and film on
ghent film festival takes British cinema out of Hollywood shadow
ian mundell
Follow Ian \ @IMundell
With new and classic film and a day devoted to British
movie music, the Ghent Film Festival puts the spotlight
on an industry that, according to organisers, sorely needs
rescuing from the long, long shadow of Hollywood.
“T
he British are coming!” declared Colin Welland
when he accepted his Oscar in 1982 for writing
Chariots of Fire.
Well, not quite.
In the decades since then, British cinema has remained in
Hollywood’s shadow, and it often struggles to find an audience, both at home and abroad. This is one reason why the
Ghent Film Festival has chosen to put it in the spotlight this
year, with a programme of new art-house films, a selection
of classic movies and a day devoted to British film music.
“We want to show that the UK has a very dynamic film
industry, even if you read reports in British papers and
film magazines that are very critical of it,” explains Patrick
Duynslaegher, the festival’s artistic director.
Britain is a more controversial choice than last year’s focus
on France. “Most people wouldn’t ask why we were doing a
focus on France because in film buff circles, France is widely
accepted as having one of the greatest cinema traditions
in the world,” Duynslaegher continues. “I think Britain has
great film, too, and has had great periods in cinema, but
these are less well known to the general public.”
The festival’s British section features 11 recent films by
new or largely unknown directors. In making the selection,
Duynslaegher set out to confound expectations that British cinema would be all about costume drama and gritty
realism in the style of Ken Loach or Mike Leigh. “We also
wanted to show another kind, a British cinema with imagination, which is more flamboyant and less realistic.”
Carol Morley’s The Falling, for example, is a dreamy film
about an epidemic of mass hysteria and fainting in an
English girls’ school in 1969. Then there is Max Sobol’s You
(Us) Me, a very dark comedy about a love affair between a
serial killer and a suicidal girl (pictured above).
But the strangest of all is probably London Road, directed by
Rufus Norris. This began life as a series of interviews with
people living in a community affected by a notorious murder
case. Those transcripts were then turned into a stage musical at the National Theatre in London, then into this musical
film, shot in realistic settings with Olivia Colman (Broadchurch) and Tom Hardy (The Drop) in leading roles.
“It’s a very surprising film,” says Duynslaegher, “and a little
bit daring in the sense that you have to adapt to it, and you
have to accept that unusual way of telling a story.”
The Ghent Film Festival is likely to be the only time we’ll
see these films on the big screen in Belgium. Only two
films from the British section will see local distribution:
the grimly realistic 45 Years by Andrew Haigh and wartime
costume drama A Royal Night Out by Julian Jarrold.
British films also feature in some of the festival’s other
continued on page 5
\ CURREnT AFFAIRs
Pharmacists want law changed
to allow them to give flu shots
measure would simplify procedure and improve immunisation rates, say associations
andy furniere
More articles by Andy \ flanderstoday.eu
T
he East Flemish pharmacists association Kovag and
the Belgian Pharmaceutical Association (APB) have
asked for the legal right for pharmacists to give flu
vaccinations to customers.
Currently, patients must ask their general practitioner (GP)
for a prescription, go to the pharmacy for the medication
and then go back to the GP for the shot to be administered.
According to pharmacists, this procedure is too complicated.
If they could administer the shots themselves, “more people
would receive the vaccination, and the population would be
better protected against the flu epidemic coming this winter,”
said Kovag president Geert Heungens.
Pharmacists in other European countries are already offering flu shots, such as in Portugal, Ireland and the UK. Rates
of immunisation have increased as a result. But GP association Domus Medica said that a lack of knowledge of patients’
medical backgrounds is an obstacle in changing the system.
“GPs know their patients best,” said a Domus Medica spokesperson. “A GP is also available after normal work hours for
patients who can only come to get their shots then.” Domus
Medica did acknowledge that the procedure should be easier.
In a reaction, APB emphasised that it didn’t want to exclude
GPs. “We want to open a debate on how to organise the
system to better reach certain target groups,” explained APB
president Jan Depoorter. He also said that pharmacists would
need to undergo training in the procedure.
© Isaac Arjonilla/ZUMA Press/Corbis
New mums should breastfeed longer,
says health department
Half of socialist rail union to
strike on 9 October
Many women who give birth in hospital and breastfeed there stop breastfeeding when they get back
home, despite breastfeeding having numerous positive health benefits for both babies and mothers,
according to Belgium’s public health department.
Breastfeeding is also beneficial to the bond between
mother and child, the department explained as it
launched its new campaign to encourage new mums
to breastfeed their babies as long as possible, up to
two years.
The federal department launched the campaign
during the International Week of Breastfeeding,
which kicked off last week. “A large majority of pregnant women in Belgium give birth in hospital,” said
campaign spokesperson Laurence Doughan. “In the
last few years, assistance in hospitals for mothers
who want to breastfeed has improved substantially.”
But as soon as mothers leave the hospital, many
stop breastfeeding, either right away or within a few
weeks. As the number of days that new mothers stay
The socialist trade union CGSP,
representing
French-speaking
staff of the national rail authority NMBS, has announced it will
strike for 24 hours from 22.00
on 8 October to 22.00 on 9 October. The action is likely to cause
severe disruption on the whole
rail network.
The Dutch-speaking wing of the
union (ACOD Spoor) has called
on its members not to join the
strike. CGSP is protesting against
the plans of federal minister for
mobility Jacqueline Galant, which
a spokesperson described as “a
haemorrhaging of personnel” to
be avoided “at all costs”.
ACOD Spoor called on its
members not to join the strike,
tinyurl.com/BrEastfEEdingcamPaign
© Ingimage
in hospital continues to decrease, the department
wants to familiarise pregnant women and new mothers with the various avenues of continued support.
The campaign website provides information on
breastfeeding in public, personal statements from
breastfeeding mums and the legal right to breastfeed
at work. \ AF
Flemish motorists unsure how to react to sirens and lights
Flemish motorists are not clear
on how to react to emergency
vehicles using sirens and flashing lights, according to a survey
carried out by the motoring
organisation VAB. “The results are
alarming and confirm the findings of the drivers of emergency
vehicles,” the organisation said.
The survey of 2,000 drivers was
inspired by complaints from drivers of priority vehicles – ambulances, fire brigade and police –
that people do not react in the
correct way to their presence.
Those faulty reactions not only
\2
“blues and twos”: blue lights and a
two-tone siren simultaneously. By
law, only the latter is considered a
priority vehicle, to which all other
traffic on the road must yield.
VAB issued its own advice: take
no unusual evasive action, signal
your manoeuvre with indicators,
27%
of Flemish civil servants check
their work email at least once a day
from home. Only 2% have no internet connection at home, compared
to 18% of the general population
day tourists visited the coast this
summer, a 5% increase on 2014,
according to the tourism agency
Westtoer. Longer-term rentals
were up by 2%, and hotel bookings
increased by 1%
vaB.BE/vErkEErstEst
don’t do anything to endanger
yourself or other drivers (going
through a red light to make
way for the priority vehicle, for
instance), and be aware that one
priority vehicle may be followed
by others. VAB has launched a test
for drivers on its website.
999
6.2 million
393,648
cars in Belgium likely to be affected
by Volkswagen’s corrupted software to falsify emissions test
results, according to economy and
consumer affairs minister Kris
Peeters
hinder the progress of emergency
vehicles, they can place other
road users in danger.
For example, 82% of those polled
were unaware of the difference
between an emergency vehicle
with blue lights in operation and
one operating what insiders call
as talks continue on a proposed
agreement. “We want to give these
talks a chance,” the union said.
Despite being limited to half of
the country, the action on Friday,
9 October, is likely to cause severe
disruption to the all-important
North-South connection through
Brussels, which affects a large
number of national rail routes.
CGSP could, the union suggested,
follow with actions on 19 and 20
October, although it has issued no
official warning.
NMBS warned of “severe commercial and financial consequences”
on 9 October and advised passengers to seek alternative means of
travel on the day. \ Alan Hope
5,700
claims for damages made to a
government disaster fund in
connection with a severe hailstorm
that took place in June 2014. The
number is a record for any type of
natural disaster in Flanders
companies declared bankrupt in
September, the lowest number
since the start of the economic
crisis in 2008, bringing the year’s
total so far to 8,002, or 3.8% lower
than the same period last year
octoBEr 7, 2015
WeeK in Brief
The owners and operators of the
ill-fated Badboot in Antwerp
have presented their alternative. Le
Formidable is a party boat measuring 67 metres and offering three
function rooms and a large terrace
on deck. The Badboot, which
served as a floating swimming pool
during the summer and an ice rink
in the winter, sank last month. Its
winter programme, including the
ice rink, will take place inside the
nearby events venue CadX.
Only about half of all people in
Flanders visit the dentist regularly, with up to 33% staying
away for as long as three years
at a time, according to a survey
carried out by the socialist health
insurer SM, which has launched
a campaign to encourage regular
dental check-ups. From January
next year, patients who have not
been checked in the last year will
pay more for treatment than those
who get regular check-ups.
The architectural plans of a number
of sensitive buildings, including
courthouses, prisons and NATO
headquarters, previously available for all to see on the website of
the federal buildings agency, have
now been secured behind a login
and password, home affairs minister Jan Jambon told the Interior
committee of the federal parliament.
A shoplifter fleeing the scene in
the centre of Hasselt last week got
a surprise when one citizen went
off in pursuit – Olympic decathlete
Hans Van Alphen, a local resident.
Van Alphen was paying for shoes in
the Ambiorix store when the thief
stole a belt and took off. The thief
then mounted a bicycle and soon
let the belt drop. Van Alphen gave
up the chase to the applause of
onlookers.
The Free University of Brussels (VUB) introduced a vegan
dagschotel (dish of the day) Last
Thursday on its Etterbeek campus
face of flanders
in recognition of World Veggie
Day. The vegan dish will change
every week, joining the regular
vegetarian options on the menu.
The change comes in response to
requests from students, a university spokesperson said.
The city of Brussels has been
ordered to pay damages of €500,000
to the Hotel Metropole on De
Brouckereplein for loss of earnings caused by the new pedestrian zone. The court heard how
the hotel is no longer accessible
by car at the front entrance. Meanwhile, an association representing
retailers inside the zone and in the
surrounding area has demanded
action from Brussels-City to tackle
the 20 to 30% decrease in earnings since the main boulevard was
pedestrianised at the end of June.
Hardest hit are boutiques in the
Dansaert area. “We cannot survive
on the custom of local residents,”
said one. “We need the purchasing power of people from wealthier areas and from the Flemish
periphery.” Many former visitors
are under the impression that the
centre of the capital is no longer
accessible.
Ghent University PhD student
Warda El-Kaddouri will address
a United Nations committee on
behalf of the children and young
people of Flanders next week in
New York. El-Kaddouri, 25, was
chosen by the Flemish Youth Council to take part in a meeting of the
committee on social and humanitarian affairs of the General Assembly, which will be considering the
role of young people after 2015.
Her speech concentrates on youth
unemployment and discrimination in the workplace against
young people of foreign descent.
Maurice De Velder, the former
owner of the racy P Magazine,
had been given the go-ahead by
the Brussels commercial tribunal
to buy back the magazine, together
with Culinaire Ambience. De Velder
owned the titles previously, but
his company, Think Media, ran
into difficulties, and they were
put up for sale. Other Think Media
titles such as Che and Menzo will
be bought by Antwerp publisher
Cascade.
A 24-year-old student in Antwerp
was arrested and questioned last
week after posting a joke on
Twitter. Mohamed Ouaamari was
attending an event at the city’s ING
tower when he tweeted: “Anyone
got any networking tips? Shouting out Allah u akbar is probably
not a great idea, right?” Someone
replied: “Try it and let us know how
you get on,” and Ouaamari replied:
“Tomorrow’s news: 25 dead and
93 injured after mass hysteria in
the ING building”. The staff of the
bank cleared the hall and notified
the police, whose special intervention squad tracked Ouaamari
down. The city’s prosecutor will
now decide whether it should press
charges.
Pink Ribbon België, the campaign
to raise awareness about breast
cancer screenings, has released
its new pink ribbon, which was
designed by Belgian fashion
designer Edouard Vermeulen, head
of Natan. The new ribbon, marked
off in centimetres like a dressmaker’s tape, is on sale in clothing
stores across the country for €3.
Every day in Belgium, 29 women
are diagnosed with breast cancer,
with six of them eventually dying
from the disease.
Horeca Vlaanderen, which represents the food service industry, has
launched the No Food to Waste
campaign, which kicked off in the
three-star restaurant Hertog Jan
in Zedelgem, near Bruges. Flanders throws away about 2.3 million
tonnes of food a year, said Horeca
Vlaanderen director Danny Van
Assche. The food service industry
is responsible for about 8% of food
waste. A new website invites chefs
to join up and gives advice on how
to cut waste.
Het Nieuwsblad, when the three
men were at a previous edition of
the Boekenbeurs signing books for
© Rob stevens/kU leuven
sonja de Becker
The farmers’ union Boerenbond
has announced the retirement
of its president, Piet Vanthemsche. He will remain until the
end of the year, at which point he
will be replaced by the current
deputy, Sonja De Becker. The
move makes De Becker the first
woman to lead the union, one of
Flanders’ most prominent.
De Becker, 47, is a lawyer and
started her career with the union
in 1990 as an adviser to its legal
service. She went on to work
for SBB consulting in Leuven as
head of the department of environmental consulting before
returning to Boerenbond as
deputy general secretary in 1997.
She became general secretary in
2001, then took over as deputy
president when Vanthemsche
was confirmed for a second term
in 2013.
“Sonja De Becker has, throughout her career, built up an
outstanding level of knowledge
and experience of the different
aspects of both Flemish agriculture and the working of the
organisation,” the union said in
a statement.
Flanders’ agricultural sector,
particularly fruit growers, has
suffered a year of uncertainty
since the introduction of the
Russian boycott on EU exports,
including apples, pears, tomatoes and pork. That comes on
top of a more structural problem
– the price supermarket chains
pay to farmers for their produce.
In many cases, that price is not
sufficient to cover the costs of
raising the animals or the crops,
let alone allow funds for investment. Vanthemsche’s main
achievement was the creation
of a permanent representation
that brought farmers, retailers
and the food industry around
the table to thrash out problems.
That led to winning slightly
higher prices for milk and pork,
but the problem is built into the
system.
Hope resides, however, in a plea
to the public to allow farmers a
fair price. Some 30,000 people in
Flanders have signed a petition
pledging their willingness to
pay more for their food if farmers would earn more from it. De
Becker takes over as Boerenbond establishes itself as a union
with broad public support, even
when its members’ tractors are
blocking roads into and within
the capital. \ Alan Hope
\ nofoodtowaste.be
offside
recipe for murder
A best-selling TV chef has been
found murdered at the annual
Boekenbeurs in Antwerp, and a
well-known lawyer is being questioned. It’s not news, luckily,
because the murder is fictional,
even if the victim is very real.
He’s Jeroen Meus, celebrity chef and
one of the top-selling authors in
Flanders with his cookbooks filled
with simple, everyday recipes. The
lawyer is Walter Damen, the son
of a TV actor himself. Damen has
co-authored the book Moord op
de Boekenbeurs (Murder at the
Boekenbeurs) with Jan Willem
Geerinck.
It all started, Damen (pictured) told
© Courtesy Boerenbond
flanders today, a weekly English-language newspaper, is an initiative of the flemish
region and is financially supported by the flemish authorities.
fans. It gave him the idea for the
opening of the book. The star cook
is killed early in the book, and fellow
TV chef Piet Huysentruyt becomes
involved in the investigation in a
manner we won’t give away.
Both chefs gave permission for their
names to be used in the book. All the
other characters are fictional. “We
worked on it for two or three years,”
Damen told the paper, explaining
how he found the time while representing some high-profile cases in
Flanders, including Islamic radical Fouad Belkacem and killer Kim
De Gelder. “But it made a pleasant
change from what can sometimes
be a gruelling job.” \ AH
The logo and the name Flanders Today belong to the Flemish Region (Benelux Beeldmerk nr
815.088). The editorial team of Flanders Today has full editorial autonomy regarding the content
of the newspaper and is responsible for all content, as stipulated in the agreement between
Corelio Publishing and the Flemish authorities.
Editor Lisa Bradshaw
dEPuty Editor Sally Tipper
contriButing Editor Alan Hope
suB Editor Linda A Thompson
agEnda Robyn Boyle, Georgio Valentino
art dirEctor Paul Van Dooren
PrEPrEss Mediahuis AdPro
contriButors Rebecca Benoot, Bartosz
Brzeziński, Derek Blyth, Leo Cendrowicz,
Katy Desmond, Andy Furniere, Diana
Goodwin, Julie Kavanagh, Catherine
Kosters, Toon Lambrechts, Katrien
Lindemans, Ian Mundell, Anja Otte, Tom
Peeters, Daniel Shamaun, Senne Starckx,
Christophe Verbiest, Débora Votquenne,
Denzil Walton
gEnEral managEr Hans De Loore
PuBlisHEr Mediahuis NV
Editorial addrEss
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vErantwoordElijkE uitgEvEr
Hans De Loore
\3
\ POlITICs
5tH coluMn
The comic and
the minister
Flemish environment minister Joke Schauvliege (CD&V)
is under attack from all sides.
Opposition party Groen, for
example, has demanded that
climate be removed from her
portfolio. “It has been proven
that she achieves little or
nothing in this area,” Groen’s
Björn Rzoska told the Flemish
parliament. “She makes nothing but bad decisions. With
the Paris climate conference
coming up, Flanders cannot
afford to blunder. The minister-president should take this
responsibility into his own
hands.”
That the environmental
party opposes the minister
is no surprise, but another
hit Schauvliege probably
never saw coming. Comedian Wouter Deprez launched
a vicious attack on her policies after she gave a transport
company permission to cut
down some woodland in Genk
to expand their premises.
Deprez’s indignation was soon
shared by many, on social
media and beyond. Surely
there is room enough in Genk,
which in recent years saw the
closure of the large Ford plant,
for a truck company to expand
without sacrificing trees?
And shouldn’t the minister
in charge of nature protect it
rather than give it up?
Schauvliege based her decision on an environmental
report that stated that there
were no viable alternatives.
Also, the transport company
promised to create 400 jobs
– which hit the right note in
the unemployment-stricken
province of Limburg.
However, the minister embarrassed herself somewhat in a
television interview when she
called the company’s activities “water reliant” – they
are not – and indicated that
the site was near a waterway
– it is not. She later admitted
the error, but Deprez enjoyed
the notion that he is more
familiar with the issue than
the minister. His campaign
to save the woods has since
gained momentum.
Schauvliege
also
seemingly fell out with a prominent party member. After she
announced that she would
file a complaint against Volkswagen for tampering with
its emissions test results,
federal minister for work,
Kris Peeters, warned her not
to react “hastily”, as there are
thousands of jobs involved in
Belgium.
Flemish education minister Hilde Crevits, also CD&V,
stepped in and called the
attacks on Schauvliege “undeserved”. That must have been
a relief, for it has certainly
been a rough time for the
minister. \ Anja Otte
\4
Flemish minister-president on
economic mission in Atlanta
geert Bourgeois joins dutch prime minister in visit to us logistics hub
alan Hope
More articles by Alan \ flanderstoday.eu
F
lemish minister-president Geert Bourgeois
is co-leading a three-day economic
mission to Atlanta this week, together
with Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte. The
pair landed in the city, the capital of the state
of Georgia in America’s deep south, on Monday.
The Flemish-Dutch delegation includes 85 representatives from industry, about 30 of them from
Flanders, according overseas investment agency
Flanders Investment & Trade (FIT). The joint
mission is the second of its type; in 2013, Rutte
and former minister-president Kris Peeters
visited Houston, Texas.
Georgia is seen as a major gateway to the south-
Environment minister
files complaint against
Volkswagen
Flemish environment minister Joke Schauvliege
has begun legal action against car manufacturer
Volkswagen for breaching emissions limits.
The news follows revelations that VW used in-car
software to falsify emissions test results. The Flemish government’s complaint means a magistrate
will begin investigating the case, reporting later to
the prosecutor’s office, when charges could follow.
“I think we have to consider Volkswagen partly
responsible for possible European fines if Flanders
fails to meet its clean-air targets,” she said. “The
manufacturer manipulated the data on emissions
from their cars. Those cars could be driving on our
roads and have a direct influence on our air quality.”
Penalties could theoretically be as high as €200,000
for every day Flanders fails to meet the norm.
“We are pursuing a policy on fine particulates,
based on the test results,” said Schauvliege. “If it
now turns out those results are false, our policy is
undermined. It’s only logical that we should take
steps to establish Volkswagen’s responsibility.” \ AH
© Courtesy Atlanta Visitors Bureau
east of the country, with more than 12,000 logistics businesses offering access from Atlanta
(pictured) to the rest of the continent. Atlanta
is also seen as a growth area for high-tech business, specialising in cyber-security and financial
technology.
“The United States continues to be one of our
most important business partners outside of
Europe, as well as being responsible for one in
three inward investments to our region,” Bourgeois said. “The mission with the Netherlands
will focus on financial technology, web security
and smart logistics.”
“Disruptive technologies are the game changers
in industry,” said FIT director Claire Tillekaerts.
“Both the logistics industry and the banking
world stand at the dawn of a new revolution.
Flanders is rich in innovative companies that
can play a significant role in these changes, and
we will be taking them with us to Atlanta.”
Refugee camp dismantled, rejected asylum-seekers stay
The tent camp that has housed
asylum-seekers waiting to be
processed in Brussels since
the beginning of September
has been dismantled. The refugees remaining last week were
moved to the WTC III office
block, with some lodged with
host families.
The camp was originally set
up by the Red Cross when
the stream of refugees arriving at the Office for Foreigners nearby could no longer
be processed without a delay.
Before being processed, refugees cannot be accommodated by the federal office for
asylum Fedasil, and the tents
in Maximilianpark served as
temporary shelter.
As the weather got colder,
camp residents turned to the
alternative accommodation
offered by the government in
© Anadolu/Belga
Refugees are moved out of
Maximilianpark in Brussels
the WTC office complex. The
volunteer group Burgerplatform, which was involved in
the day-to-day running of the
camp, assigned some of the
remaining refugees to host
families – 200 in all.
The Burgerplatform took over
a hangar on Willebroekkaai by
the canal to carry on with the
services it previously provided
in the camp: psychological counselling, legal advice,
medical assistance and laundry services.
A group of about 100 so-called
sans-papiers – people without
aresidencepermitforBelgium,
some of them rejected asylumseekers – took over some of the
tents in the park to draw attention to their plight. They had
joined the newly arrived refugees in the tent camp, obtaining food and, in some cases,
Dutch lessons and jobs advice.
They then moved on to the
new location on Willebroekkaai. As Flanders Today went
to press, the police were trying
to force them to move on.
September saw the arrival of
5,472 new asylum-seekers in
Brussels, the highest number
ever recorded, according to
federal migration minister
Theo Francken. More than one
in four were fleeing the war in
Syria. \ AH
Bourgeois delivers annual September Declaration
Flanders is ready to meet the challenge of integrating refugees and bringing them into the
workforce, according to minister-president
Geert Bourgeois, speaking last week in his
second September Declaration. The speech
is the traditional opening of the new political
session delivered to the Flemish parliament.
Since his first declaration on taking office last
year, Bourgeois said, the world has changed
radically, with the refugee crisis facing Europe,
the cooling of the Chinese economy and the
Russian food boycott with its huge effect on
Flanders.
“The refugee crisis presents us with a budgetary challenge,” he said. “Our country is seeing an
influx of about 4,000 asylum-seekers a month,
the great majority of whom can expect to be
given at least temporary permission to remain.
After they are recognised as refugees, Flanders will begin an integration process. We are
prepared; the Flemish government took action
in time. We are able to accept these recognised
refugees humanely and in a quality manner.”
The declaration this year, he said, was partly
formed by the long-term vision for 2050 recently
approved by the government. It was also influenced by the goals of the sustainable development agreement reached by the United Nations,
© Frederik sadones/Demotix/Corbis
Geert Bourgeois entering parliament to deliver the annual
september Declaration
which includes access to health care and education, an end to poverty and inequality, a strong
economy in which everyone takes part and
justice in a safe and peaceful society.
He stressed the importance of women’s rights.
“Sustainable growth is only possible if the gap
between men andwomen is reducedworldwide,”
he said. “Women who are healthy, educated
and have autonomy over their lives create more
wealth for their families, and for their communities. That is also one of the important points
of Flemish development co-operation. Together
with Melinda Gates, we would say: ‘If we help
women, we can save the world’”.
Bourgeois recalled the challenges facing the
new government a year ago, including low
growth, EU budget regulations and a deficit of
half a billion euros. “Your government could
have chosen the way of least resistance, the way
of increased borrowing or higher taxes,” he said.
“We did not. We faced up to our responsibilities
and chose the way that offered hope and opportunity.”
Because of those efforts, he said, the way was
now open for investment. Those would include
increased spending on care homes, child care
and people with a handicap. The government
has approved 2,300 loans for energy-saving
measures, has a budget of €42 million for cultural
infrastructure and has earmarked €100 million
for the building and extension of schools.
The budget for investment in 2016 would be €4.5
billion, he said, with targets including smalland medium-sized enterprises, innovation in
industry, higher education, transport infrastructure, road safety, green mobility and transition to sustainable energy. Social housing alone
will see spending of €800 million.
“In short, we are on the right road,” he said. “The
road that leads to cutting taxes, extra investment in people and the economy and a balanced
budget.” \ AH
\ COVER sTORy
octoBEr 7, 2015
Keep calm and film on
filmfEstival.BE
British cinema, guests galore and flemish premieres at ghent film fest
worldsoundtrackawards.com
continued from page 1
sections. Slow West, an existential western shot in New Zealand
by John Maclean, is in the main
competition, while Suffragette by
Sarah Gavron gets a gala preview.
This drama about England’s early
feminist movement stars Carey
Mulligan, Helena Bonham Carter
and Meryl Streep.
There is also a strong British presence in the festival’s retrospective
section, where the aim has been
to show the diversity and flamboyance of British cinema. Hence Ken
Russell’s extravagant musical The
Boyfriend, starring Twiggy (who
features on the festival poster), and
the lush beauty of Black Narcissus by Michael Powell and Emeric
Pressburger.
You can also see the coolest spy
movie ever made (The Ipcress File,
with Michael Caine), Ken Loach’s
landmark social realist film Kes
and Midnight Express, followed by
a Q&A with director Alan Parker,
who is head of the competition
jury this year.
Finally there is a chance to watch
John Schlesinger’s 1967 version
of Far From the Madding Crowd,
with Julie Christie and Alan Bates
taking the roles played this year by
Carey Mulligan and Flanders’ own
Matthias Schoenaerts.
The British theme extends to film
music, the festival’s specialist
subject. On 22 October, the annual
film music seminar allows professionals to pass on their knowledge about film music and sound
design.
It begins with veteran British
composer George Fenton discussing his long collaboration with
director Ken Loach, then continues with relative newcomer Daniel
Pemberton discussing the differences between composing for
A musical about a notorious murder case? say goodbye to Hollywood in British director Rufus norris’ london Road
British and North American film
productions.
That evening the Brussels Philharmonic performs the Great British
Film Music concert: music written
by British composers for British
films, accompanied by clips. “In
making this selection I’ve tried to
cover, through the music, as many
aspects of British cinema as possible,” says Duynslaegher.
So the Shakespearian tradition is
represented by William Walton’s
score for Laurence Olivier’s Richard III, and by more recent music
by Patrick Doyle for Kenneth
Branagh’s Shakespeare films and
by Stephen Warbeck for Shakespeare in Love. Ron Goodwin’s
score for Where Eagles Dare represents the war film, while spy
films (and swinging London) are
opening nigHt: d’ardennen
Dave is in rather a pickle. His older brother,
the dangerously unstable Kenneth, is fresh
out of prison, having served time for a
crime they committed together. So Dave
owes him one, it would seem, but instead
he is in a relationship with Kenneth’s old
flame, Sylvie, with whom Kenneth is still
very much in love. And she’s pregnant.
A web of secrets and lies is spun until the
brothers find themselves on their way
to the eponymous region to the south to
dump a body for which Kenneth’s jumpy
rage is very much responsible. Bone-chilling madness ensues.
D’Ardennen, which opens the Ghent Film
Festival on 13 October, is the feature debut
of Flemish director Robin Pront. He’s definitely been paying attention to Flanders’
newfound style of gritty cinema, having
given us a kind of Rundskop/Twin Peaks
hybrid, and, while he occasionally tries
a bit too hard to be quirky, he has gotten
more than the best from these actors.
Jeroen Perceval, a Rundskop alumnus, is
finally allowed to show us how great he is,
quietly understated as Dave’s face shows
every struggle and worry wrought upon
him. Kevin Janssens (Vermist), usually cast
as a dull pretty boy, finally gets something
to sink his teeth into playing Kenneth and
pulls it off beyond all expectation. Veerle
Baetens could play the trashy but levelheaded Sylvie in her sleep.
It’s hard to imagine opening night ticketholders – at least those with strong stomachs – being disappointed. Pretty much the
entire cast of D’Ardennen will be around to
talk about the film after the screening on
opening night. \ Lisa Bradshaw
covered by John Barry’s music for
the The Ipcress File and John Dankworth’s music for Modesty Blaise.
Social realism gets a nod through
Fenton’s music for Loach, while
the costume drama is represented
by Craig Armstrong’s score for the
most recent Far From the Madding
Crowd (a world premiere concert
performance). Finally, there is the
minimalist composer Michael
Nyman, whose work is synonymous with the films of Peter
Greenaway.
Fenton, Warbeck, Armstrong and
Nyman are set to attend while
their music is performed. Meanwhile, Doyle will receive a lifetime
achievement award at the World
Soundtrack Awards ceremony and
concert on 24 October.
farrell and friends in gHent
Pull out your mobile phone
cameras, Colin Farrell is in
the house. At a film festival
that includes more than 75
guests, Farrell (In Bruges,
Crazy Heart) is the biggest
name this year, in Ghent
with Greek director Yorgos
Lanthimos (Alps) to introduce their new film The
Lobster.
It’s one of the movies with
the most buzz at this year’s
festival, a darkly comedic
take on people’s obsession
with being in a relationship.
An alternate reality requires
those who do not find a
mate within a given period
to be turned into the animal
of their choice. (Farrell
chooses a lobster.)
Another great actor to see
Colin Farrell (sitting) in The lobster
live is Géza Röhrig, largely
responsible for making the
Hungarian film Son of Saul
as great as it is, playing a Jew
surviving Auschwitz as a
member of the Sondercommando work unit, who were
tasked with helping at the
gas chambers in return for
not being put in one themselves.
On a local level, you’ll find
Belgium’s hottest directors of the moment, Adil El
Arbi and Bilall Fallah, in the
cinema to talk about their
new film Black, about rival
gang members in Brussels
caught up in a Romeo-andJuliet-inspired scenario.
Documentary filmmaker
Manu Riche (Snake Dance)
will be on hand to discuss
his first foray into directing
fiction. Problemski Hotel,
adapted from the novel by
Dimitri Verhulst, looks at a
relationship between two
asylum-seekers in Brussels
– one happy to stay where
he is and the other with a
thirst to move on. \ LB
\5
\ BUsInEss
WeeK in
Business
Air Jetairfly
The Brussels Airport-based
charter airline, part of the
German TUI group, is seeking 23 additional aircraft to
develop its activities over the
coming years. The company,
which employs 1,100 people,
is recruiting an additional 120
air hosts for 2016.
Brewing Duvel
The beer group, based in
Puurs, Antwerp province, has
bought a stake in the trendy
Amsterdam brewery ’t IJ.
Brewing Omer
The Kortrijk-based brewery
is investing €10 million in a
new brewery and distribution centre to increase capacity. The beer group, named
after its owner, fourth generation Omer Vander Ghinste,
recently won a prize at the
World Beer Awards and has
high hopes in export markets.
Dredging Jan De nul
The
Aalst-based
dredging company has won the
contract to build the €660
million offshore wind farm
Nobelwind. The project calls
for some 50 turbines to be
installed 45 kilometres off
the coast of Zeebrugge, with
production slated for late
2017.
Metals Umicore
The Brussels-based nonferrous metals and materials
group is investing €25 million
to renovate its Olen cobalt
refinery to increase capacity
by 25% and increase competitiveness. Demand for cobalt
worldwide has increased
significantly because of its
extensive use in the new
generation of batteries.
Retail Vanden Borre
The electronics and appliances retail chain is expected
to be taken over by the French
FNAC group as part of a
€720 million bid on Darty, its
London-based parent. Meanwhile, Vanden Borre plans
to launch a kitchen installation outlet in early 2016, with
hopes for a further 50 locations in the coming years.
supermarkets
Colruyt
The Halle-based supermarket
chain has acquired 40% of the
online distributor MyUnderwear24. Colruyt has an option
to push its stake to 100% over
the next 10 years as part of the
development of its web-shopping activities.
\6
Huge crowds for combo Open
Bedrijvendag and Shopday
annual business and shopping events coincide with sunshine
alan Hope
More articles by Alan \ flanderstoday.eu
T
he second edition of
Sunday Shopday has been
declared a success by
organisers, with almost 5,000
retailers taking part in 310
municipalities last Sunday. The
crowds enjoyed some unusually
sunny and warm autumn
weather.
In Brussels, the event was met
with protests from unions representing retail staff, with a procession down the busy Nieuwstraat
to publicise the view that Sunday
opening must remain “limited
and exceptional”. Although
Sunday Shopday is an annual
event, pressure is growing for
more regular Sunday shopping.
Next year’s event will take place
on 2 October.
Also on Sunday, Flemish economy minister Philippe Muyters
gave the starting shot for the 25th
edition of Open Bedrijvendag
(Open Business Day), when the
public was invited to visit some
350 companies across Flanders
for tours, workshops and other
activities. About 650,000 visitors
took part.
Muyters also announced his
plan to make subsidies easier for
companies to obtain, for those
that agreed to accept external consultations on how to run
their business more efficiently.
The aim, he said, was to encourage companies to innovate and
grow on a permanent basis
© sofie Coreynen
AB InBev shareholders plan capital increase
The Belgian and Brazilian families who still control a large part of
the shares of AB InBev have begun
increasing their holding in the
Leuven-based brewery, as a protection against the dilution of their
stock by a takeover of rival brewer
SABMiller.
Last month, InBev, the world’s
largest brewer, announced that it
was in talks with SAB, the world’s
number two. SAB’s main shareholders, the American cigarette
company Altria and the Colom-
bian Santo Domingo family, said
they were only interested in selling
in return for AB InBev equity.
In the meantime, the Belgian and
Brazilian family shareholders of
InBev – EPS and BEC respectively
– have been buying up shares to
increase their joint holding from
51.4% to 51.9% now, at a cost of
€873 million.
The two holding companies representing the families have also
taken credit lines from their banks
for a value of €3.7 billion, handing
over 42.6 million shares as security. That money is thought to be
waiting to fund a capital increase
in the immediate wake of a takeover of SAB. As a result, the share of
the company held by the families
would not be diluted by the arrival
of new SAB shareholders.
In related news, the federal government has responded to a threatened move of the company’s head
office from Leuven to London with
the offer of a reduction in the levy
paid by foreign shareholders on
dividend income. The move to
London was said to be one of the
conditions of the takeover imposed
by SAB shareholder Altria, to avoid
having to pay tax in Belgium.
Federal finance minister Johan
Van Overveldt proposed a reduction of the tax from its current rate
of 25%, 15% or 10%, depending on
the type of income involved, to
only 1.69% on condition the shareholder concerned hold a minimum
of €2.5 million in shares of the new
merged brewery. \ AH
Women discriminated against for VRT board rejects cost-cutting plans
promotions, says study
The board of directors of FlemAn initial reading of the plan by
Women who interview for a higher
position than their present job can
expect to make less of a positive
impression on male interviewers
than their male competitors, according to research carried out for the
Flemish department of work and
social economy.
The researchers looked at 576 vacancies and sent in a CV and cover letter
identical but for one difference: one
copy was signed with a man’s name,
the other with a woman’s. In general,
there was little difference: 26% of
men and 25% of women got a positive reaction, while 11% of men and
10% of women were invited for an
interview.
When it came to jobs involving a
promotion, however, the gap opened
up, with men gaining 23% more positive reactions than women. When it
came to being invited for an interview, men did nearly 50% better than
women. The researchers describe
the results as “ethically as well as
economically unacceptable”.
“Discrimination like this can only
be rooted out by increasing its cost,”
they said. “There is a modern and
far-reaching
anti-discrimination
legislative framework in this country that could increase the chance of
uncovering unequal treatment.” They
suggested a systematic application
of the methods used in this study, as
well as possibly making job application procedures anonymous. \ AH
ish public broadcaster VRT has
refused to approve a “transformation plan” proposed by management, which would have meant
the meant the loss of nearly 300
jobs.
The proposed plan was drawn up
at the request of the government
of Flanders and was leaked at the
start of September before it could
be considered by the board. The
main points were the loss of about
50 jobs a years until 2020 and the
closure of regional offices of Radio
2 in Antwerp and Kortrijk. Following the leak, the plans for Radio 2
were dropped, and now the board
has refused to accept the rest of
the plan as it now stands.
Creative sector in the spotlight for Born in Antwerp
The city of Antwerp has launched a
new project for the creative sector
called Born in Antwerp – Harbour
of Creativity. Five leading names
from the sector have been named
as curators.
Antwerp describes its creative
sector as “exceptionally rich and
diverse,” with some 8,000 creative enterprises – one in six of all
businesses in the city. “There has
always been room for renewal in
Antwerp, ever since the Golden
Age,” said alderman for culture
Philip Heylen, launching the
project.
“Thanks to our smaller scale, our
view of the world, outstanding
training available and the interest shown by residents,” he continued, “creative people really get the
chance to offer something new.”
Born in Antwerp, which kicks off
in December, is a programme of
international events, including
exhibitions by graduates in the
creative disciplines and shows by
designers, both well-known and
just starting out. The event culminates in September of 2016 with a
four-day festival to coincide with
the re-opening of the PlantinMoretus Museum.
Five curators have been named for
Born in Antwerp: fashion designer
Bruno Pieters; industrial designer
the board led to it being postponed until the government clarified the question of its contribution to restructuring costs
estimated at about €20 million.
The government responded with
the promise of €7 million a year in
2016 and 2017.
The board, therefore, said that the
plan in its present form is impossible to implement. “The VRT board
is convinced that a transformation is required to create a more
modern and flexible media organisation in a socially responsible
manner,” the board said in a statement. \ AH
Axel Enthoven; graphic and 3D
artist Rizon Parein; artist Lieven
Segers and Isabel Van den Broeck,
managing director of the Creative
Club of Belgium.
“Creativity is in the DNA of our
city,” said Antwerp mayor Bart De
Wever. “With this project and the
campaign associated with it, we
want to shine a light on what an
unusually creative city Antwerp
is.” \ AH
\ InnOVATIOn
octoBEr 7, 2015
The science of laughter
WeeK in
innovation
stand-up science comedy night in Brussels puts the fizz into physics
andy furniere
More articles by Andy \ flanderstoday.eu
W
e don’t generally think of scientists as
funny – at least not “ha ha” funny. But
next week, eight researchers and a
science communicator from Flemish universities
will deliver science-related jokes during a
stand-up comedy night at the Rits Café in the
centre of Brussels.
The event, completely in English, is organised by
Brussels’ Expertise Centre for Science Communication and was inspired by the Bright Club
concept of science comedy evenings in the UK.
What started at University College London (UCL)
now draws crowds all over the country.
The idea for Bright Club Brussels came up during
the most recent “Let’s Talk Science!” summer
school focused on science communication,
organised by all five Flemish universities. One of
the activities was a stand-up comedy workshop in
which Flemish science comedian Lieven Scheire
was involved.
Scheire, who will MC the Brussels Bright Club
event, made contact with Steve Cross, the founder
of the concept, when he was working in science
communications at UCL. “We realised that standup comedy brings science to a wide audience in a
way that is fun and accessible,” explains co-organiser Sofie Verkest of the Expertise Centre.
So the centre found eight researchers from the
Free University of Brussels (VUB), Ghent University and Antwerp University willing to take up
the challenge. One of the centre’s own science
communicators joined them.
Since the acts will be in English, several participants are expats. “It’s a great opportunity to
include more international researchers in our
activities,” says Verkest.
Most of the participants work in natural sciences,
which is perhaps surprising as people working in
this field are usually considered to be more introverted than social scientists. “It’s great that these
researchers want to improve the reputation of
their field,” says Verkest. “We need to attract more
young people to these studies.”
During an extensive training session, Cross taught
the participants the basic comedy skills needed to
© Courtesy UCl
A scientist on stage at University College london, where the
Bright Club concept began
perform on stage. They learned about timing, attitude and how to structure a joke.
“An important tip for researchers is not to avoid
easy, silly jokes,” say Cross. “Scientists often
construct very clever and complicated jokes but
forget to go for the occasional easy laugh.”
Cross has a background in research himself,
having a PhD in human genetics. “But that’s so
long ago, a robot could do that work now,” he says,
smiling. “These days, I enjoy showing people that
science is not all about dry facts but also about the
people who make scientific discoveries happen.”
After the workshop, participants received a –
scientific – book about the reasons people laugh.
For the event on 13 October, they must prepare
an act that lasts about eight minutes. That day,
they will rehearse in the afternoon, during which
Cross will evaluate their acts. A few hours later,
they will try their jokes in the spotlight, after MC
Scheire has warmed up the crowd.
Nevena Hristozova, a Bulgarian molecular biologist at VUB, is looking forward to getting on stage.
“I learned to let go of my inhibitions and allow
spontaneous ideas to take form,” she says.
For her act, Hristozova plans to focus on the
atmosphere on campus and specifically on
awkward social moments. “I often pass people in
the hall who just look away when I say ‘hello’,” she
says. “But I persist, and, when they finally answer
me, I take revenge by never saying ‘hello’ to them
again – when they then expect it.”
On the other hand, Flemish scientist Ben Verhoeven, a specialist in computational linguistics at
Antwerp University, will be concentrating on the
content of his research. Verhoeven’s work deals
with developing ways to determine the age and
gender of anonymous authors.
“Marketingexpertscanusemyfindingstodiscover
what sort of people have an opinion about a product and adapt their strategy,” he explains.
A third participant, Freya Blekman, specialises in
elementary particle physics. Originally from the
Netherlands, Blekman is a professor at VUB and
works on projects at Cern, the European Centre
for Nuclear Research in Geneva.
“Our research at Cern has a lot of surreal aspects,”
she says. “For example, we have just about the
largest machines in the world to work with the
smallest particles possible.”
13 october
RITs Café
Dansaertstraat 70, Brussels
Flemish students send particle detector into atmosphere
Hacordua.wix.com/Hacord
Any hikers in the Swedish countryside might have been surprised
last week by what they witnessed
on the horizon: a rapidly rising
balloon aiming for what appears
to be … outer space?
That’s almost, but not precisely,
true. The balloon will stop and
hover 30 kilometres above the
ground, right in the Earth’s stratosphere.
The balloon, rising from the ground
near Kiruna in the Lapland area
of Sweden, is carrying equipment
that will investigate cosmic rays,
the extra-terrestrial high-energy
radiation – partly produced by the
sun – that’s constantly bombarding our planet.
The detector on board won’t measure the cosmic rays directly but
will register the different particle cascades, or “airshowers” that
originate through the interaction
of the rays with the Earth’s atmos-
phere. The overall question to be
answered is: How does our planet’s atmosphere protects all living
organisms against this sterilising
radiation?
The research balloon and the
launching equipment (pictured)
have been provided by the European Space Agency (ESA), but the
detector in the balloon’s basket
was built entirely by four students
from Antwerp University (UAntwerp). The quartet won this year’s
edition of Rexus/Bexus, a competition that offers students the
opportunity to have their experiments transported by a sounding
rocket and a stratospheric balloon.
“When cosmic rays collide with
particles in the upper layer of
our atmosphere, an air shower of
secondary particles is produced,”
explains Jeroen Van Houtte, physics student and the team’s leader.
“Those particles will collide with
other particles, and so on. Because
of the many collisions, these air
showers become richer in particles as they propagate towards the
Earth’s surface – until the energy
is too low to create new particles.
We want to investigate how much
these air showers change over
time, according to their angle and
depending on the latitude.”
Another issue the Antwerp
students want to tackle is the
correlation between cosmic rays
and the solar cycle – the sun’s
11-year cycle of activity. Van
Houtte: “This may sound counterintuitive, but during a high activity
period, fewer cosmic rays will be
measured. That’s because a more
active sun provides more magnetic
shielding, which keeps cosmic rays
from reaching the Earth. But this
correlation is not yet well documented. We hope to improve that.”
The students’ project, dubbed
Hacord ( for High Altitude Cosmic
Ray Detector), originated in UAntwerp’s physics department. “We
had to step out of our own discipline and focus on more technical questions,” says Van Houtte.
“That’s also why one of our team
members is an engineer. This
resulted in a unique interdisciplinary collaboration.” \ Senne Starckx
Campaign to increase
password security
A new campaign by Cert.be,
the federal cyber emergency
team, encourages people to
use a pass-sentence instead
of a password to improve
internet security. “Passwords remain the key to
much personal and professional information,” said
Cert.be co-ordinator Christian Van Heurck. “If you have
access to somebody’s email,
you have access to their
life: documents, purchases,
photos, social media and
work accounts.” A longer password, he said, protects both
privacy and information, and
the campaign is advising the
use of pass-sentences. These
are short sentences that are
easy to remember and safer
than an ordinary password
because of their length.
skeleton growth
gene found
Researchers
from
the
Centre for Medical Genetics at Ghent University and
University Hospital Ghent
have discovered a gene that
is of major importance in
the development of the skeleton. While examining the
genome of babies with serious bone deformities, the
researchers discovered a
gene that encodes for the
TAPT1 protein; the function
of the protein was previously
unknown. On the basis of
hereditary research, they were
able to pinpoint the involvement of the protein in bone
development. The findings
provide important perspectives for future research.
25,000 a year born
with cholesterol
disease
About one in 450 Belgians is
born each year with familial
hypercholesterolemia (FH),
according to Ghent University
cardiologist Ernst Rietzschel,
interviewed in Het Laatste Nieuws. FH is a genetic
disorder characterised by
high cholesterol levels. Only
about 4% of Belgian residents
with the disease are aware of
their condition. Many residents have high levels of LDL
cholesterol, considered high
at 115 mg/dl. But FH patients
have even higher levels since
birth, with values between 250
and 400 mg/dl in the blood.
Patients don’t notice these
high cholesterol values, but
they lead to accelerated cardiovascular diseases, as early
as the age of 30. The disease,
caused by a disruption of
the bodily mechanism that
normally breaks down cholesterol, is hereditary. \ AF
\7
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\ EDUCATIOn
octoBEr 7, 2015
On the right track
WeeK in
education
new book looks at the importance of following the right educational path
andy furniere
More articles by Andy \ flanderstoday.eu
I
n their new book Ik was 10 in
2015, education experts Pedro
De Bruyckere and Bert Smits
provide parents, teachers and
other educators with advice on
raising the kids of today.
It’s the third book the pair have
written together, and its presentation this week in Ghent cultural
centre Vooruit was a festive affair
afforded to few non-fiction writers in Flanders: a talk by top child
psychologist Peter Adriaenssens,
poetry by Maud Vanhauwaert
and an acoustic performance by
Johannes Genard of Flemish rock
band School is Cool.
The authors are keen to reach
out to parents, including young
parents, about how contemporary
society affects their kids. They got
the inspiration for Ik was 10 during
their lectures, when parents often
expressed insecurity about their
children’s future.
“We wanted to address this insecurity through a ‘rationally optimistic’ approach,” says De Bruyckere.
“We don’t ignore problems, but we
do want to show there’s no need for
despair.”
De Bruyckere and Smits look at the
main trends that will shape society in the next decade, the period
in which children who are now 10
will become adults. They offer tips
and information on best practices
but also devote a chapter specifically to “what children should
learn”.
One important issue is choice of
study. “More and more people feel
it’s important to focus on preparing children for a specific profession than providing a broad education,” says De Bruyckere. “But
studies have demonstrated that a
broader education has advantages
over the long term.”
Research shows that children
who follow a specific vocational
programme on average get a job
more quickly than those who
follow a more general programme.
But after five years, young people
with broader knowledge catch up
and tend to get better jobs.
“That’s because broader knowledge enables people to ‘learn to
learn’ better,” explains De Bruyckere. “They become more flexible
and have the ability to analyse situations, which means they climb
the socio-economic ladder more
easily.”
In a society where self-made entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Mark
Zuckerberg are considered icons,
the value of a diploma is increasingly being questioned. Peter Thiel,
the founder of e-payment system
PayPal, even awards funding to
youngsters who choose to establish a start-up enterprise instead
of going on to higher education.
“Studies emphasise the importance of graduating from higher
Pedro De Bruyckere looks at a changing society in his new book Ik was 10 in 2015
education by showing that, on
average, people with a diploma
still achieve a higher standard of
living than those without one,”
says De Bruyckere. “However, a
diploma should be seen less as a
goal and more like a starting point
towards additional development,
like a driving licence that enables
you to get on the road.”
representative of the government
of Flanders, is setting up projects
in the capital.
The authors also address the
issue of the socio-economic gap
that threatens the prospects of
young people from a disadvantaged background. They emphasise that small-scale initiatives,
like programmes in which volun-
A diploma should be seen less as a
goal and more like a starting point
towards additional development
The two experts provide teachers
with tips to help children acquire
essential knowhow like problemsolving and networking skills.
They also emphasise the importance of supporting youngsters in
becoming autonomous.
As a best practice, they refer to
the concept of “teenager schools”,
which offer specialised support to
children between 10 and 14 who
find the transition from primary
to secondary education difficult.
The concept comes from the Netherlands but is finding its way to
Flanders. The Flemish Community
Commission in Brussels, the local
teers read to children at home, can
produce significant results.
For example, Stanford University
in the US sends parents of toddlers
living in challenging conditions
language and mathematics tips
via text message three times a
week. They encourage parents, for
example, to show their children
the letters on a shampoo bottle
when putting them in the bath to
see if they contain letters from the
child’s name.
The first results show that parents
become more involved in their
children’s literacy and development, and the children themselves
clearly benefit.
An important theme in Ik was 10 is
how parents are finding it increasingly difficult to devote enough free
time to their children. Kids’ agendas are often fully booked with
extracurricular activities, such as
music lessons, sports and youth
clubs. “For many children, online
networks are rare refuges where
they can still escape their parents’
monitoring,” says De Bruyckere.
Sites such as Facebook, however,
also endanger a child’s “right to
be forgotten”. “Youngsters have
to experiment and they should be
able to forget the mistakes they
make in the process of growing
up,” says De Bruyckere. “But since
their lives are increasingly being
recorded, this becomes more difficult, so it’s important to ask children whether they want to have
their photos posted on Facebook,
for example.”
The authors refer to a movement in
the US that counters the trend of
increasingly monitoring children:
the “free range kids” who receive
more freedom and trust from their
parents. The term was invented
by New York journalist and blogger Lenore Skenazy, who stirred
up discussion when she described
how she let her nine-year-old son
– at his own request – go home
alone from the supermarket via
the metro and bus.
At the end of the book, the
researchers provide some assurance and advise parents to “keep
calm and carry on”. The last Pisa
report by the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and
Development showed that about
85% of 15-year-olds in Flanders
are happy at school, while other
studies show that in most European countries, bullying, drinking
alcohol, smoking cannabis and
unsafe sex among youngsters have
all decreased.
“But of course, it’s still essential to
pay attention to phenomena like
binge drinking and radicalisation,”
says De Bruyckere. “We have to
keep on increasing the investment
in our young people.”
Change in language
attracts female
students
Using “female” words in
brochures for technical studies helps convince students
to choose these disciplines.
Researchers from Karel de
Grote University College in
Antwerp have announced
these findings, illustrated by
a study among 750 secondary school students. They
presented students with
brochures for two study disciplines considered “male”
(chemistry and applied informatics) and two considered
“female” (teacher training
and nursing). Students saw
see three kinds of brochures:
one with neutral adjectives,
one with “male” adjectives
and one with “female” adjectives. Students who read the
brochures on technical studies with “female” adjectives
were about 10% more likely to
choose the study than those
who read the same brochure
with “male” adjectives.
schools must
address unconscious
discrimination
Research has concluded that
teachers in Flemish secondary schools unconsciously
assign more C certificates
to children with a migration
background than to other
students with similar results
and attitudes. A C certificate
requires students to repeat a
year. The finding is one of the
results of PhD research by Els
Consuegra of the Free University of Brussels (VUB). “Teachers are unconsciously guided
by stereotypes and expectations,” she told De Standaard.
Her research also showed that
teachers are stricter with boys
than girls in secondary education.
Exhibition shows
power of maths
The annual Flemish Mathematics Olympiad for secondary school pupils is celebrating its 30th anniversary with
the free exhibition Imaginary, hosted by all five Flemish universities in turn. The
exhibition showcases the
many sides of mathematics
for a wide audience and was
conceived by the Mathematical Research Institute in Oberwolfach, Germany. It has been
praised internationally for its
methods in illustrating the
power and beauty of mathematics to students, teachers and the public. It shows,
for example, how mathematical models are essential for
daily applications in ordinary
life. Imaginary is currently on
show at Ghent University.
\ vwo.be/vwo/imaginary
\9
\ lIVInG
WeeK in
activities
Fair Trade week
Learn about the fair trade
labelandhowyourpurchases
help independent producers in developing countries
better their lives and their
communities. Workshops,
tastings, concerts and more.
7-17 October, across Belgium
\ weekvandefairtrade.be
kweikersparade
Hundreds of costumed
participants will parade
through the centre of Tienen,
portraying 10 events in
the history of the city from
Roman times to the industrial age. Giants, plus fireworks. 10 October, starts
at 18.30, fireworks at 21.00,
Tienen city centre, free
\ kweikersparade.be
Badger walk
Limburg’s Voerstreek has the
largest badger population
in Flanders. Follow a guided
walk to discover its favourite haunts. Register at info@
voerstreek.be or 04 381 07
36. 10 October 10.00-12.00 &
14.00-16.00, Visitor centre,
Pley 13, ’s-Gravenvoeren, €4
\ voerstreek.be
Pick your own fruit
What could be better than
autumn fruit plucked fresh
from the tree? Plastic bags
provided, or bring your own
crates and baskets. Fruit
costs €0.60 per kilo. 10-11
October, Fruit LambrechtBaart, Leiegoeddreef 9, St.Eloois-Vijve (West Flanders),
free
\ fruitlambrecht.be
night of Darkness
Annual event to draw attention to light pollution and
energy waste, as cities
douse or dim their street
lights. Activities include
guided walks, stargazing and
candlelit dinners. 10 October,
across Flanders
\ bondbeterleefmilieu.be/nacht
Pumpkin chunkin’
Teams take turns firing
pumpkins into the air using
giant, homemade catapults. No, really. The winner
is crowned national champion and goes on to the
world championship. Entertainment, food and drink.
11 October, 13.00-17.00, Oosteneind, Kasterlee (Antwerp
province), €3
\ pompoenschietenkasterlee.be
\ 10
Beanie baby
knitting hobby transformed into global fair trade business
rebecca Benoot
More articles by Rebecca \ flanderstoday.eu
lnBEaniEs.com
E
llen Kegels is no slave to
trends. You may have recently
noticed how more and more
people have started knitting and
crocheting their own winter wear,
but Kegels was bitten by the DIY bug
a long time ago.
“I was 15 when I started,” she says.
“I went snowboarding every year
and making your own headbands
and beanies [knitted hats] was part
of the subculture. I did it mainly for
friends and family during my studies, and after six years I was making
300 beanies a year thanks to a little
help from social media.”
Kegels, 28, studied communications
and subsequently embarked on a
career in advertising. It provided her
with skills that helped to create the
popular LN Beanies knitwear line.
Four years ago, the Antwerpenaar
gave up her day job to focus all her
attention on her booming beanie
business.
“I started looking for manpower
because I couldn’t meet the demand
all by myself,” Kegels explains. “I
began training grandmothers who
already loved knitting and had the
time to spare.”
Regardless of the name, LN Beanies does not just sell beanies. You
can find a variety of unisex scarves,
mittens, socks and sweaters, all
made from 100% pure baby alpaca
wool.
Two years ago, Kegels introduced
an additional line called LN Andes,
a women’s collection made out of
bouclé wool. This collection is now
available in over 25 stores, including
at a dedicated LN shop, LNKNITS,
in Antwerp. The LN Beanies items
vary in price, from €60 for a beanie
to €295 for a sweater.
“When I started with LN Andes, I
chose to place the production in
© Courtesy ln Beanies
Ellen kegels visits workers in Peru and sports one of her trademark beanies
Peru,” Kegels explains. “It is a line
that is fair trade and handmade by
Peruvian women.” Now nearly all LN
Beanies production is done in Peru.
“Over 300 women in three workshops are creating them.”
But the grandmothers are still busy,
she assures us. “Thanks to LN Lab,
you can design your own personalised beanie. These are still made by
the Antwerp grannies.”
Kegels’ business is based on four
core principles: only natural materials (such as alpaca, silk and linen),
manufacturing by hand by local
women, excellent customer service
and personal branding. The fair
trade label is something she is especially proud of.
Solid International is an organisation that shares experience and
knowhow with locals in regions
around the world where there isn’t
much conventional trade or a developed economy. With their help,
Kegels was able to get production in
Peruofftheground,aftershelearned
about a local project in the Peruvian
city of Ayacucho that provided shelter to teenage mothers.
“Many of these young girls find
themselves out on the street and,
although they then had shelter, they
didn’t have jobs. So we started to
educate and train them.” Two-thirds
of the workforce is now made up of
these women.
But Kegels’ ideas went even beyond
that, she says. “My dream when I was
making my business plan was to give
work to an entire village. The men
would rear the alpacas and produce
the wool, and the women would
produce the designs.” The 200 young
women now working now in Ayacucho is the first step toward that ulti-
mate goal.
Besides the fine knitwear, you can
also buy baby alpaca wool in the
new Antwerp store as well as two
books Kegels has written that gather
fun knitting patterns. She’s working
on a third book: a cookbook filled
with Peruvian-inspired menus using
superfoods.
Bite
raw food chef spreads vegan gospel in new cookbook
If you’re into raw food, you probably
know Julie Van den Kerchove from
her popular food blog Julieslifestyle.
com. Her love story with raw food
goes back a long time.
The young chef from Zomergem,
East Flanders, became a vegetarian
as a teen and eventually enrolled in
a training course to become a raw
food chef at the Living Light Culinary Institute in California. It wasn’t
because she was eager to join in on
the raw food trend but because she
was convinced a plant-based diet
could cure her constant fatigue.
The raw and vegan lifestyle did
end up making Van den Kerchove
(pictured) feel better. That’s why,
together with her partner Simon,
she started a blog to share recipe
ideas. She has now published her
first cookbook, Julie Natuurlijk
(Julie Naturally), where she gets
creative with fruit, vegetables, nuts
and seeds.
The rule around raw food is that
it shouldn’t be heated above 50
degrees celsius to ensure that all
the vitamins and minerals are
preserved. But Van den Kerchove
decided to include a number of recipes for bread, pancakes and sweet
potatoes as well, to ease us all into
the idea.
A sample of the recipes in the book:
banana bread with hazelnut chocolate spread, watermelon lemonade, oriental carrot and curry salad,
sweet potato falafel wraps and
walnut balls in tomato sauce.
Know that the switch from an average diet to a vegan one – let alone
to raw foods – can be challenging.
Your body and digestive system will
need some time to adapt to the new
regime. Rookie raw foodies tend to
undereat and, as a result, lose a lot
of weight in the first weeks.
Both in the book and on her blog,
Van den Kerchove shares her experiences and offers tips. And if you’re
juliEslifEstylE.com
waiting for the right moment to give
vegan food a go, circle 1 November in your agenda, which is World
Vegan Day Belgium, organised by
BE Vegan.
If all this isn’t enough to convince
you to say your farewell to meat and
dairy products, Van den Kerchove
has got a few more tricks up her
sleeve. She and Simon are starting workshops on preparing vegan
meals. They’ve also launched their
own line of vegan foods, which
includes products like granola,
biscuits and crackers. You can buy
the products online or at selected
stores. \ Katrien Lindemans
Julie Natuurlijk is published in Dutch
(for the English version, see Van den
Kerchove’s blog)
octoBEr 7, 2015
Charted territory
History, geography and archives meet in cartesius online map project
andy furniere
More articles by Andy \ flanderstoday.eu
F
our key local institutions
have created an innovative
tool that allows them to work
interactively with an extensive
collection of diverse maps. The
National Geographic Institute
(NGI), Royal Library of Belgium,
Royal Museum for Central Africa
and the State Archives of Belgium
have together launched the
Cartesius project.
The NGI was the driving force
behind the project, the latest in a
long line of applications initiated
by the organisation, which was
founded at the same time as the
nation of Belgium.
Cartesius, launched a few weeks
ago, brings together digitised maps
from the four institutions, each of
which has a different focus. “Cartesius offers viewers maps with information from a geographic, historical and archival perspective,”
explains project leader Rink Kruk of
NGI from the institute’s headquarters at the Ter Kameren abbey in
Brussels.
Cartesius doesn’t just assemble maps, it also includes intelligent features. It can automatically provide relevant, detailed
charts related to the royal palace
if you select it on the portal, from
16th-century maps to more recent
versions.
NGI researchers have also put
together all the old large-scale maps
of the Belgian territory – for example, those created between 1860 and
1873 – so you can see on one image
how Belgium looked at that time
and directly compare it with more
recent periods.
Via the Mycartesius application,
a sort of digital lab, visitors can
experiment with the various maps.
You can visualise the urbanisation
of Brussels, the extension of the
port of Antwerp and the densification of the Flemish road network
© Courtesy nGI
Antwerp mapped in 1852; nGI staff collect data to ensure their maps are accurate
over the centuries.
Visitors can also integrate their
own information, such as situating remains of castles in their home
region. However, only a limited
the scale of deforestation,” explains
Kruk.
The tool could also be useful in
schools.Teacherscouldaskstudents
to determine in which year a canal
Our application is developed
according to the highest
professional cartographic standards
number of trusted experts from
museums and research centres are
able to embed this kind of detail on
the portal’s main gallery.
Cartesius has a long list of practical applications. History researchers can use it to analyse trends like
industrialisation. “The tool can also
help to establish environmental
policies, by showing things such as
was developed by comparing maps
from different periods. The tourism
sector should also benefit. “With
Cartesius, it would be possible to
create an app that allows visitors to
Bruges, for example, to walk around
digitally in the medieval city centre,
by enabling them to navigate on a
medieval map,” declares Kruk.
The NGI has recently proved that it
can provide the necessary knowhow for a tourism app. It helped
create the BeCarto14-18 app, which
allows users to quickly find relevant
locations and events related to the
commemorations of the First World
War in Belgium.
Such digital applications and the
current way of mapping – with 3D
technology, aerial photos and satellite navigation systems – were still
futuristic visions when NGI was
founded. It was established immediately after Belgium became independent, in 1831, as a military
organisation.
“The main function of the NGI then
was to map the borders with the
Netherlands, from which Belgium
had seceded,” explains Ingrid
Vanden Berghe, head of the NGI.
Gradually, its goals were broadened
to other policy areas. And the NGI
is no longer just a producer of topographic maps, but also co-ordinates
the integration of specific geographical data created by bodies such as
the national rail authority NMBS.
With all the information it has gathered, the NGI provides customised
advice to organisations from all
domains, from government departments to companies. The NGI also
constantly updates its CartoWeb
web service, a digital map containing its most recent topographic
data. “You could compare it to
Google Maps, but our application
is developed completely according
to the highest professional cartographic standards and includes
more specialised info,” says Vanden
Berghe.
An anecdote from a few years ago
illustrates how Google cannot
achieve the same precision as the
NGI. The mayor of Mürringen, a
town in Liège province, claimed on
the basis of Google Earth data that
the highest point in Belgium was
in his town. NGI experts, however,
showed that the nearby Signal de
Botrange was correctly considered the official highest point in the
country. “Google Earth didn’t take
into account the height of the trees
on the terrain,” explains Vanden
Berghe.
The police can use NGI data and
CartoWeb to get a good overview of
an area if they need to track people,
while for ambulance services, the
application is equally essential.
Companies are among NGI’s clients
as well: Garmin based a navigation
system for mountain bike riders on
NGI’s data.
To make sure they provide the
correct information, NGI staff don’t
just work with innovative 3D technology: they also go out on the
terrain. “You can’t always identify whether a building is a sports
centre or school through images on
aerial photos,” says Vanden Berghe.
50 weekends in Flanders: Homemade chocolates in Bruges
Flanders Today has launched an
e-book with ideas for how to spend
a year’s worth of weekends. Visit
our website to get your free copy of
50 Weekends in Flanders. We’ll also
print one of our suggestions every
week here, too.
The historic town of Bruges is
thickly spread with chocolate shops.
Here are five traditional family businesses dotted around the old streets
that stand out from the crowd.
DEPLA
Pol Depla creates sublime chocolates using the finest cocoa beans
he can track down. He adds to the
flavour with unexpected ingredients like cut flowers. Depla also
creates striking chocolate animal
sculptures in his workshop, which
he displays in the shop window.
THE CHOCOLATE LINE
The enfant terrible of Flanders’
chocolate trade, Dominique
Persoone sells his wares in a
15th-century wine merchant’s
house facing a statue of Simon
Stevin. The former chef works with
food scientists to create chocolates
flavoured with eccentric ingredients like fried onions, salty bacon
and tobacco leaves. (But there are
normal ones, too.)
\ poldepla.be
SWEERTVAEGHER
This little shop lies off the tourist trail in a quiet street behind the
Markt. It is run by a West Flanders
family that has been in the chocolate business since 1933. They use
the very best chocolate to create
special pralines with names like
Grenoble and Snobinet (pictured).
\ thechocolateline.be
\ sweertvaegher.be
DUMONT
It’s often a tight squeeze to get into
this tiny space run by the Dumont
family near the Markt. They have
been creating the finest handmade
pralines since 1992.
\ chocolatierdumon.be
SUKERBUYC
The Depreter family started creating handmade chocolates in 1977.
They now employ a young chef
who comes up with new recipes, as well as unusual choco-
tinyurl.com/50wEEkEnds
late souvenirs. This is the place
to come if you want to buy, say, a
chocolate jigsaw puzzle. In their
eatery across the street, you can
sample the wares and the city’s
most famous hot chocolate.
\ sukerbuyc.be
SPEGELAERE
The oldest chocolate shop in
Bruges, Spegelaere has been selling pralines since 1954. It stands
on a quiet street away from the
tourist crowds, so most of the
customers are locals. The family
recently added a B&B above the
shop where you can sleep in a
chocolate-themed room.
\ sweetchocolatedreams.be
\ 11
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octoBEr 7, 2015
We live here
antwerp exhibition looks at how residents are transforming architecture
tom Peeters
More articles by Tom \ flanderstoday.eu
vai.BE
An exhibition at deSingel shows how the
inhabitants of iconic post-war building
projects in Morocco, India and Brazil have
creatively updated the architecture and
adapted it to current times.
S
tanding on a scaffold, looking down
on the six case studies that make up
the exhibition Lived-In: The Modern
City as a Performative Structure, it’s easier
to distance yourself from the projects
architects such as Oscar Niemeyer and Le
Corbusier realised in the second part of
the 20th century. Their sometimes heavily
contested urban constructions just don’t
seem as rigid as their opponents thought.
“Let it be a lesson for today’s architects and
designers,” says Tom Avermaete, a professor
in architecture at Delft University of Technology and co-curator of Lived-In. “Architecture is not perfect or static, but it will
always be adapted and changed by its users,
constructors and the following generations
of architects.”
That’s exactly what visitors will notice when
they stroll along the tables with drawings,
photos and scale models, and it is emphasised by a double narrative. On one side of
the six tables are the stories of the planners
and the architects, the ones who come up
with the big concepts. On the other side are
the stories of the people who live there.
“We noticed that, after multiple decades,
there’s a completely different story to be
told,” says Avermaete. “Sometimes the big
concepts worked out, other times there was
resistance. Even more interestingly, we saw
that inhabitants, developers, contractors or
new architects started to transform these
buildings. That’s why the title of the exhibition is Lived-In.”
“These icons of architecture became icons
of different ways of living,” adds co-curator
Maristella Casciati, a professor of architectural history at the University of Bologna.
“We noticed users wanted to identify with
their place, make it their own. In our mixed
society, people want to create a synergy
between the place they live in and who they
are.”
“That’s why we’re talking about the modern
city as a performative structure,” says Avermaete. “People don’t want a certain lifestyle
imposed on them, so it’s only logical that
urban planners and architects are taking
their preferences into account.”
The extension of Casablanca, Morocco, by
© le Monde
life in la Courneuve, a new town in the Paris suburbs
the French urban planner Michel Ecochard
in the 1940s is illustrative. After a thorough
analysis of where the new residents came
from, he developed a planning system based
on grids, all consisting of a traditional courtyard dwelling. “So even in a hyper-modern
city, they had something that reminded them
of their previous rural lifestyle,” explains
Avermaete.
Ecochard thought people would only make
little extensions to their horizontal housing, he explains, but something completely
different happened. Residents started to add
layers, making it a vertical city.
New floors were rented out, or taken by
family members, but the traditional patterns
of the original plan, such as the courtyard,
survived. “It’s what we call the generosity of
the generic,” explains Casciati. “The architects offer a coherent framework but leaves
space for further development.”
The same can be seen in Chandigarh, the
capital of the Punjab region in post-independence India. A French team led by Le
Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret introduced
aesthetic controls by which some parts of
the building could be changed, while others
couldn’t.
In both Casablanca and Chandigarh, the
landscape was crucial. The vertical update
of Casablanca, for instance, was only possible because urban planners incorporated
the green environment into the modern
city. “Compared to this, it’s such a pity to see
that our own landscapes are so badly maintained,” says Avermaete. “Often they are just
turned into uninviting parking spaces.”
No surprise, then, that the curators prefer
the city of Brasília. This icon of modern architecture, developed by Oscar Niemeyer and
Lucio Costa, was conceived in the middle
of the Brazilian jungle. For Avermaete, it’s
proof that the landscape can allow a city to
be updated to fit with contemporary living.
“Very big dwelling clusters, called superquadras, were put in a very strong natural
environment, encouraging inhabitants to
appropriate their surroundings.”
Three more cases show other ways of appropriation. In the 1950s, when Paris suffered
an enormous shortage of housing, urban
developers started to build prefabricated
skyscrapers for the masses in the suburbs. La
Courneuve was such a ville nouvelle, providing living space for people coming from rural
areas and from the colonies.
But it was frequently criticised, as is shown
here in press clippings and in the movie Two
or Three Things I Know About Her by the leading nouvelle vague director Jean-Luc Godard.
“The situation among the residents was
problematic, and the architecture was held
responsible for the squalid conditions,” says
Avermaete. “Now people no longer want to
demolish these buildings; they want to reinterpret them, by adding a thick facade, for
instance, with terraces providing a more
comfortable environment, or by investing in
urban gardening initiatives.”
Throughout the 1960s and ’70s, the concept
of prefabrication was even more visible in
the Berlin extension of Marzahn. Standardised and very basic Plattenbau elements
were assembled on location.
“Since it’s too difficult to transform these
elements on a collective scale, Germany has
developed a programme to deconstruct the
separate elements and reuse them for single
family houses,” says Avermaete.
He adds that the people behind the new
neighbourhood of Skjetten near Oslo learned
from the Marzahn case, creating a building system and delivering, with every key, a
user’s manual, explaining how residents can
adapt their own houses.
“As a result, you see transformations, allowing a variety of individual lifestyles, but keeping a collective coherence,” says Avermate,
pointing out that our own Flemish modern
heritage is far too often frozen. “It can’t be
touched, while all of our case studies show
that transformation is a natural process.
Reflecting on architecture is always about
the negotiation between what is planned
and what is lived.”
until 10 january
Desingel
Desguinlei 25, Antwerp
More exHiBitions tHis WeeK
Echo • Tina Gillen
guy de cointet
the Bottom line
Luxemburg-born, Brussels-based artist
Tina Gillen is known for depicting a
layered reality, somewhere between figuration and abstraction, and between two
and three dimensions. Happily incorporating the exhibition space into her work,
her monumental site-specific installation
Echo (pictured) includes a massive mural
and yearns for an intimidating interaction
with the visitor. Until 7 February, Bozar,
Brussels
The late Guy de Cointet was a native French
artist who moved to the US in the mid1960s, where he was heavily influenced by
Pop Art and collaborated with Mike Kelley
and Paul McCarthy. His first retrospective
in Belgium shows drawings, sculpture and
sketchbooks, focusing on his fascination
for language, text and meaning. Check out
the performance Comme il est blonde! at
Leuven’s Playground Festival in November.
Until 10 January, M, Leuven
About 50 international artists show what a
pencil means to their work, to the contemporary art scene and to the world. The
difference in perspective, scale and style of
the sketches by artists as diverse as Francis Alÿs, Anne-Mie Van Kerckhoven, Paul
McCarthy and Tacita Dean promises to
instigate a broad range of emotions. Some
drawings will be created especially for this
exhibition, some even in situ. 10 October to
31 January, SMAK, Ghent
\ bozar.be
\ mleuven.be
\ smak.be
\ 13
\ ARTs
WeeK in arts
& culture
Alain Platel wins
Flemish Culture Prize
Choreographer and theatre director Alain Platel has
been awarded this year’s Flemish Culture Prize for cultural
services, a sort of lifetime
achievement award in the
sector. Culture minister Sven
Gatz described Platel as “a
master in bringing together
people, dance forms and disciplines”. Platel established dance
company Les Ballets C de la B in
1984, leading it into internationally recognised success. According to the jury, Les Ballet C de la
B represents “a unique, eclectic, surreal mix of contemporary dance, theatre, circus and
music, characterised by simplicity, humour, modesty and apparent chaos”. In winning the prize,
Platel joins the ranks of top
names including curator Jan
Hoet, writer Hugo Claus and
choreographer Anne Teresa De
Keersmaeker. The prize includes
€20,000.
Van Groeningen to
direct Hollywood film
Flemish filmmaker Felix van
Groeningen, best known for his
films De helaasheid der dingen
(The Misfortunates) and the
Oscar-nominated The Broken
Circle Breakdown, has been
chosen to direct Beautiful Boy
for American producers New
Regency and Plan B. Beautiful Boy is based on two books:
Beautiful Boy: A Father’s Journey
Through His Son’s Addiction by
American journalist David Sheff
and Tweak: Growing Up On Methamphetamines by David’s son,
Nic Sheff. Plan B is the production company owned by Brad
Pitt, and he has been named as
the producer of Beautiful Boy. A
timeline or possible cast has not
yet been announced. Van Groeningen is currently wrapping up
his fifth feature film, Belgica, the
story of brothers who own a cafe
in Ghent.
next Festival one
of world’s most
trend-setting
The Next Festival, an international arts festival focusing on the “Eurometropolis”
Kortrijk, Tournai and Lille, has
been named one of the 12 most
trend-setting festivals in the
world by the European Festival
Association. The award is given
to festivals that demonstrate
excellence and innovation in
programming, co-operation,
political value and long-term
vision. “This cross-border, crosslanguage approach is unique
and very innovative,” said the
jury. “Other festivals could learn
a great deal about collaboration
from this model.” The festival
runs for two weeks next month.
\ nextfestival.eu
\ 14
East meets West
Europalia back in force with focus on turkey for birthday edition
sarah crew
More articles by sarah \ flanderstoday.eu
EuroPalia.Eu
Arts and culture festival Europalia is dedicating
its jubilee edition to Turkey, a country with a
foot in Europe and a foot in Asia. With some
200 events, three major exhibitions and a fourmonth programme, the organisers hope to
strengthen ties between Turkey and Belgium.
T
he multidisciplinary arts biennial
Europalia opens next week with Turkey
as its guest country. About 200 events
that shine a spotlight on the country’s heritage
and contemporary arts scene are being staged
around the country. Forming the backbone of
the festival are three flagships exhibitions, two
at Bozar in Brussels and the third at the MAS
museum in Antwerp.
Turkey’s geo-strategic location was one factor
in its selection, according to Europalia’s general
manager, Kristine De Mulder. “It symbolises a
country with a foot in Europe and a foot in
Asia,” she explains.
The 200,000-strong Turkish population in
Belgium was another consideration. While
the choice has raised some politically sensitive questions, particularly concerning its
current government, the Armenian genocide
and ongoing Kurdish conflict, the organisers
see the event as an opportunity to challenge
perceptions of the country, strengthen ties and
concentrate on culture.
With Europalia celebrating a double anniversary – its 45th year of existence and 25th
edition – a mini festival has been launched that
reinforces artistic collaborations. Traditionally, the festival concentrates on heritage and
contemporary arts, but for this jubilee edition
it has added two more elements – creation and
exchange.
The opening exhibition at Bozar, Anatolia:
Home of Eternity, fulfils the heritage mission.
“There needed to be an interesting theme and
original point of view to introduce the guest
country,” explains the festival’s artistic director, Dirk Vermaelen. “More than 200 objects
coming from 30 different museums in Turkey is
unique in and of itself.”
Co-curated by Marc Waelkens, an archaeology professor at the University of Leuven, the
exhibition is divided into four sections that
encompass the country’s 12,000-year history.
“With rituals as the cross-disciplinary theme,
we discover a Turkey that is fascinating and
unique,” he says.
Bozar’s second exhibition, Imagine Istanbul,
explores the city as an artistic capital, says
Vermaelen. “It shows how the city inspired
artists – mainly photographers.” The main
artist is Ara Güler, known as “the eye of Istanbul” for his important series in the 1950s and
’60s that are iconic for the Turkish people and
also familiar to us.
Photographer Cartier Bresson, who worked
with Güler, and young Flemish photographer
Bieke Depoorter will also be showing new work
at Imagine Istanbul. Depoorter, who is from
Ghent and an associate member of the prestigious photograpy agency Magnum, travelled to
Istanbul as part of an artistic residency.
The third pivotal exhibition also examines
the legendary city, this time in its context as
a port city and with an eye to similarities with
Antwerp. Istanbul-Antwerp: Port City Talks takes
visitors on a journey to Istanbul via video, film
and installations by contemporary Flemish and
Turkish artists, albeit with a selection of historical treasures.
© Ahmet Polat
“smoking Girl” by Turkish-Dutch photographer Ahmet Polat, part of Imagine Istanbul
It is fittingly staged at Antwerp’s iconic MAS
museum, which dominates the city’s docklands
area Het Eilandje and is itself a bridge between
the city centre and the port.
The exhibition focuses on the role water and
the port played in the development of Istanbul as a gateway to the Orient and the rest of
the world. It draws parallels with Antwerp as
another gateway port city with a long history of
commerce and political influence.
Curated by Turkish architect Murat Tabanlioglu, the exhibition has invited a group of young
contemporary artists to create a series of audiovisual installations. They include “Bridge”
by Emre Dörter, a series of 10-second video
portraits of people by the sea in Antwerp and
Istanbul, projected side by side. Media artist
Refik Anadol uses real-time data technology
of marine traffic in “Expected” to explore the
notion of space in an ever-changing journey.
While Istanbul is a metropolis of bridges, its
Flemish counterpart relies on tunnels to access
both sides of the Scheldt. In “Tunnels”, Antwerp
resident and visual artist Els Vanden Meersch
contrasts historic wartime tunnels with images
of tunnel-like public spaces above ground.
Flanders hosts other key exhibitions, including
Ayşe Erkman from Turkey and Brussels-based
Ann Veronica Janssens at Ghent’s SMAK. The
international artists are each creating a permanent sculpture in public space in the city’s
Korenmarkt.
Another collaboration between well-known
contemporary artists is the exhibition Mystic
Transport at Centrale For Contemporary Art
in central Brussels, with work by Gülsün Karamustafa and Koen Theys.
The capital’s Flemish literary centre Muntpunt,
meanwhile, hosts Turquoise, portraits by four
photography students from the local Turkish
community. They all followed a summer workshop led by photographer Philippe Dupuich.
Muntpunt also serves as a Europalia hub, with
activities for all ages.
Exhibitions aside, the multidisciplinary
programme sees events destined to please
Belgium’s Turkish diaspora – from dance and
shadow puppetry, to literature, screenings and
performances. Concerts in Brussels include the
country’s pop diva Sezen Aksu at Bozar, sound
designer and composer Görkem Şen at PointCulture and a unique exchange between Flemish jazz musician Jef Neve and Turkish digital
collective NOHlab at Flagey.
For fans of cinema, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, the director of seminal films like Once Upon a Time in
Anatolia and the Palm d’Or-winning Winter
Sleep, presents a retrospective of his work at
venues in Brussels and Genk, as well as an exhibition of his photography at C-Mine in Genk.
A priority in the programming for Vermaelen was to promote Turkey’s largely unknown
contemporary artists. “So much of our culture
is focused on Europe; you realise how dreadfully Eurocentric we are.”
The festival is also employing its jubilee edition
to target a younger audience. “Our 25th anniversary is an ideal moment to question what
we are doing,” the artistic director explains.
“We were worried that our image was mainly
about heritage, so we’ve freshened it up with a
new logo and put more focus on contemporary
works, working with young artists and establishing residencies.”
Vermaelen adds that they are also working
with venues that attract a younger audience
and with universities to integrate its themes
into class material. “It’s important not just to
invite them, but to actively involve them,” he
explains. “Students can write articles on the
festival, which will be integrated in a digital
media centre.”
© Hasan Deniz
shipping gateways meet at Istanbul-Antwerp: Port City Talks
\ AGEnDA
octoBEr 7, 2015
Moving mountains
Reymer
until 18 december
concert
leuven
Two Gallants: San Francisco folk-rock duo and lifelong friends Adam Stephens
and Tyson Vogel perform
from their new album, We Are
Undone. 12 October 20.00, Het
Depot, Martelarenplein 12
Across Flanders
rEymEr.BE
I
n-between the jagged and
playful outbursts of ’90s
indie pop combo Flowers for
Breakfast and the introspective
folk musings of Reymer lie 20-odd
years of living. And it’s life itself
that created Thrill My Soul, says
Tine Reymer about her debut
album.
It’s the most vulnerable selection
of songs she’s ever shared with an
audience – about coping with how
you win some and you lose some,
and all accompanying doubts.
The Antwerp-based singer put
her move and TV acting career
(Loft, Sedes en Belli, Salamander)
on the back burner to focus on
what she had been missing far too
long: being a singer-songwriter.
After the break-ups of, respectively, Flowers for Breakfast, theatre company De Kakkewieten and
the mambo orchestra El Tattoo
del Tigre (co-MCed by actor Peter
Van den Begin, who would later
become her spouse), she formed
the band Billie King, whose only
album dates from 2006. “But
instead of making a second album,
I made a second daughter,” she
recalls.
A “Country Ladies” tour with Nathalie Delcroix and Eva De Roovere
put her back on the music track
and, after a retreat to a rented
apartment in Ostend, she released
Thrill My Soul earlier this year, a
\ hetdepot.be
perforMance
Brussels
humble, grown-up record steeped
in folk, country and Americana.
“I wanted to focus on the essence,”
she says. “There are no mannerisms, certainly if you compare with
my early Flowers for Breakfast
stuff. I’m less naive and impulsive.”
Her voice has also matured, on
both the high and the low notes,
clearly illustrated on charming
new single “The Hill”, featuring a
discreet Ruben Block of Triggerfinger fame.
Now she’s looking forward to
performing live again. “It’s a bit
like skiing. After a long time without doing it, you ask yourself: How
will I ever get down that mountain
again? But after two descents you
know you can.” \ Tom Peeters
festival
iedereen klassiek
the kids are all right
Across Bruges
concErtgEBouw.BE
This free festival returns to Bruges
to serenade townsfolk and tourist alike with classical music
composed by Bach, Beethoven and
more. The annual, all-day event
doesn’t just invite the public into
the concert hall. True to its name,
Iedereen Klassiek brings the music
to the people. So while Concert-
gebouw is the hub of activity and
host of an epic closing concert
starring the Brussels Philharmonic, there are 10 more venues
scattered throughout the city,
including the Markt and the postindustrial pop-up cafe URB EGG. \
Georgio Valentino
fair
9-11 october
Ghent
Beursschouwburg, Brussels
until 28 november
BEursscHouwBurg.BE
When Brussels’ Beursschouwburg
celebrated its 50th birthday last
season, its current stewards realised that the storied history of the
venue was also a cross-generational
history of contemporary art. So the
current season explores the interaction between old and young, established and upstart, parent and child.
The two-month programme encompasses theatre, dance and music
as well as multimedia and installation works. The free Meggy Rustamova exhibition Observations runs
throughout and serves as a thematic
linchpin. The Tbilisi-born, Ghentbased artist weaves images of her
own mother into various multimedia installations to reinforce the
familial metaphor (pictured). \ GV
festival
Antwerp
Closer/dichterbij:
Art,
music, theatre, literature and
gastronomy combine in this
multi-faceted festival, featuring the exhibition We Feel
Much Feelings, a joint creation by curator and painter
Stijn Dierckx, sculptors Cristian Bors and Marius Ritiu and
visual artist Liesbet Waegemans. Until 11 October, Zuiderpershuis, Waalsekaai 14
\ closerdichterbij.be
Edith cavell centenary
les Halles de schaerbeek, Brussels
The recent debt and refugee crises
have led to a broader crisis of confidence in European democracy and
(with varying results) inspired
countless citizens’ projects aiming
for social justice. Organised in
part by French crowdfunding platform KissKissBankBank, Europe
Refresh presents dozens of such
initiatives addressing issues from
HallEs.BE
corporate media consolidation
to environmental degradation
to the so-called “sharing” economy and its love-hate relationship
with labour. The common thread:
All these projects are in search of
money (or, as it’s called these days,
“participation”). Europe Refresh is
a trade fair for NGO entrepreneurs.
\ GV
10-11 october
The Golden Age Revisited:
A fresh view into the art and
artistry of the Low Countries
during the 17th century, opening on the evening of 10 October with a bar and live music
from yesterday and today.
10 October to 28 February,
Museum of Fine Arts, Citadelpark
\ mskgent.be
event
Europe refresh
\ kultuurkaffee.be
visual arts
classical
10 october, 10.00
Raak: Flemish author Saskia
De Coster invites six promising writers to put each
other through the proverbial wringer as part of an
unprecedented war of words
in an actual boxing arena
(in Dutch). 15 October 19.00,
Bozar, Ravensteinstraat 23
Holy Trinity Pro-Cathedral, Brussels
The First World War centenary
kicked off last year and won’t stop
until the armistice itself turns 100
in 2018. This year in particular,
Belgium celebrates the life of British nurse Edith Cavell, who helped
hundreds of Allied soldiers escape
to the neutral Netherlands before
she was executed by a German
firing squad on 12 October, 1915.
Her life and work is celebrated at
a Saturday night commemoration concert and Sunday morning
memorial mass, both held at the
Anglican Holy Trinity Pro-Cathedral. The concert features works by
Haydn and Sibelius as well as the
world premiere of David Mitchell’s
Cavell Mass, which was commissioned for the centenary. \ GV
EditH-cavEll-BElgium.Eu
Brussels
Artonov Festival: First
edition of this interdisciplinary arts festival featuring
music, dance, theatre and
visual arts scattered across
the city’s most impressive Art
Nouveau locations. 9-11 October, across Brussels
\ festival-artonov.eu
fair
Brussels
Book Swap Salon: Free
monthly book swap, this
month featuring a workshop
on silk-screen printing on old
books, followed by a concert
by Wanted Fire. 11 October,
Laken’s former train station,
Kerkeveldstraat 2
\ nekkersdal.be/bookswapsalon
\ 15
\ BACkPAGE
octoBEr 7, 2015
Talking Dutch
it’s nothing personal
derek Blyth
More articles by Derek \ flanderstoday.eu
I
t was fun for a while, at least it was for HAHAHA and
ZORRO 1 and anyone else who had paid €1,000 for a
personalised Belgian number plate. But then the law
caught up with them.
You may remember that last year Belgium finally introduced personalised number plates, like the ones you
often see in the US. Een nummerplaat met de naam van
je lief, een schunnige opmerking of simpelweg een gezonde
lach – A number plate with the name of your love, a lewd
comment or simply a good old-fashioned joke, as one
newspaper explained.
Belgen kunnen hun nummerplaat een persoonlijke
toets geven – Belgians can give their number plate a
personal touch, voor de kostprijs van 1.000 euro – for a
fee of €1,000. And thousands of people took up the offer.
Vandaag hebben al zo een 7.000 Belgen een gepersonaliseerde nummerplaat – About 7,000 Belgians now have
their own personal number plate, a newspaper noted
when the craze was at its peak.
You can get an insight into the Belgian mind by seeing
what they chose for their number plate. Someone went
for HAHAHA. Another chose GRRR. Others went for
slogans like CATCH ME, IM HAPPY and HIS CAR.
In the beginning, it all seemed like innocent fun. Drivers
could express their personalities while the government
raked in the cash. De gepersonaliseerde nummerplaten
hebben in een halfjaar tijd tussen de 4 en de 4,5 miljoen
euro opgebracht – Personalised number plates raised
between €4 and €4.5 million in the first six months,
according to the Vehicle Registration Office.
But a few months ago, someone noticed a serious problem. Na een parlementaire vraag – Following a question
in parliament, blijkt vandaag dat de trajectcontroles op
CONNECT WITH US
de E40 en E17 die platen niet kunnen lezen – it seems that
the mobile speed cameras on the E40 and E17 can’t read
these number plates, according to De Standaard.
HAHAHA, you might be thinking. Those 7,000 drivers
with personalised number plates could drive as fast as
they liked without the risk of a fine.
The government, as you would expect, wasn’t quite as
amused. Minister Ben Weyts wil dan ook dat er voorlopig geen gepersonaliseerde nummerplaten meer worden
uitgereikt – Minister Ben Weyts wants to stop issuing
personalised number plates, tot er een technische oplossing is gevonden voor het problem – until a technical solution has been found for the problem.
A few weeks ago, the minister announced that the
cameras had been upgraded. De slimme camera’s worden
nog wat slimmer – The smart cameras are now even
smarter, he said. Wie dacht met een gepersonaliseerde
nummerplaat aan snelheidsboetes te kunnen ontsnappen, is eraan voor de moeite – Anyone who thought they
could avoid speeding fines by buying a personalised
number plate has made a big mistake.
GRRR, a certain car owner might be thinking.
In response to: Flanders spends too much time sitting down, says
VIGeZ
Ranveer Singh
Do stand and walk every hour or second.... your manager’s
“career consultation” will not help in back pain....
In response to: Talking Dutch: world heritage humour
Kate Sanderson
With such a well organised and user-friendly public transport
system in Brussels, I fail to understand why so many still insist
on driving to work alone in their big cars – a big part of the
traffic problem here. Kudos to STIB for not losing the faith,
despite all!
In response to: Schools should address subtle discrimination,
says researcher
Emre Sevinç @EmreSevinc
very difficult to fight against unconscious discrimination
Derek @dereksteez
Night out in Antwerp, Belgium. Should be pretty freaky
© Curtesy autofans.be
Tweet us your thoughts @FlandersToday
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facebook.com/flanderstoday
tHe last Word
since tuition fees were increased this year, more and more students are asking to
pay in instalments. are fees for universities and colleges in flanders too high now?
a. Yes, this is a sign of that. If Flanders wants an educated population to ensure economic growth, it should
lower the fees
27%
b. No, but an instalment plan should be implemented for those who need it, that only makes sense
55%
c. No, and they should be raised even higher. €890 a year is nothing to get the best professors and infrastructure
18%
too high, and some even believe
they should be higher. You get
what you pay for, right?
But most votes went to the option
of allowing students (or their
parents) to pay the current fees on
an instalment plan, which more
and more students are requesting.
At Erasmus University College in
\ next week's question:
Brussels, the number of requests
to pay the fees in instalments actually doubled.
It does seem only fair to streamline a system of paying in instalments, rather than see promising
students prevented from attending
college or university at all.
Pharmacists – currently only allowed to supply flu shots to patients to deliver to their physicians – are asking to
be allowed to administer them as well (see p2). What do you think?
Log on to the Flanders Today website at www.flanderstoday.eu and click on VOTE!
\ 16
In response to: Half of socialist rail union to strike on 9 October
Rohan Poole
Anyone know if the strike on 7th will impact Eurostar
services?
PEACE IS THE MISSION @MAJORLAZER
BRUSSELS!!! WE BOUT TO ROLL THE BASS ? WITH THE
MAJOR LAZER CREW!!!
Poll
This was the first academic year
that saw fees increased from the
previous €610 per year to €890.
It’s a hefty raise all at once, and
student associations protested
against it last year when it was
under discussion – to no avail.
But most of our readers – nearly
three-quarters – don’t find the fees
voices of
flanders today
solemn promise
“I will no longer keep on driving
when I’ve had an accident.”
More than 100 Flemish drivers, including 79-year-old Nicole
Vyvey, have made a public pledge
to improve their driving under the
hashtag #verkeersbelofte
rat race
“Fever, coughing, muscle pain
and headache, dark-coloured
urine and a general feeling of
illness are among the possible
symptoms.”
The Flemish health agency warned
the 2,500 participants in last month’s
Titan Run obstacle course in Lier
that they may have become infected
with leptospirosis, a disease carried
by rat urine, which can cause brain
damage and liver failure
Big top, big deal
“The children sit in the front
row fiddling with their mobile
phones. That can be painful.
We’re here giving it our best, and
they look like they’re not interested. You can see so many things
on the internet, but we’re flesh
and blood.”
Tony Heppenheimer of Circus Pipo,
one of the last touring circuses in
Flanders
Border patrol
“This action is like using a plaster for a haemorrhage. It gives the
public a false sense of security.”
Ruddy Caelewaert of the police union
Sypol, after it was revealed that the
border patrols looking for human
traffickers consist of eight police
officers working only five hours a day
on the Belgian border with the Netherlands and Germany
[E\L