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december 14, 2016 \ newsweekly - € 0,75 \ read more at www.flanderstoday.eu current affairs \ p2

politics \ p4

‘Grand cru’ year for economy

BUSiNESS \ p6

innovation \ p7

Lobster for the holidays

education \ p9

art & living \ p10

Wintering

According to the National Bank of Belgium, 55,000 jobs were created this year, with more to come in 2017

A Flemish caterer will deliver a full lobster dinner straight to your door for Christmas, New Year or any other time

A Christmas symphony concert and a winter festival with lights and fire are two of our top picks for holiday outings

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City beneath the sea

Submerged medieval Ostend tells a cautionary tale of climate change Emma Portier Davis More articles by Emma \ flanderstoday.eu

Scientists from the Flanders Marine Institute have located submerged remains of medieval Ostend that show how rising sea levels could threaten our shoreline.

efore growing into a bustling medieval town and, eventually, the holiday destination of choice for royals and literary heroes, the city of Ostend started out as a fishing and sheep farming village on the Ter Streep island off the Flemish coast. Between the 14th and 16th centuries, a series of raging storms forced the residents to abandon the island and build a new city on the mainland. A 16th-century map of the region, made by the Dutch cartographer Jakob Van Deventer, shows streets purposefully built at right angles to each other.

This discovery may contribute to the awareness that the coastline is always changing

Making the real surreal Artist Sammy Slabbinck decontextualises the imagery that surrounds us

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Of the old town on Ter Streep, all that can be seen on the map is a church tower, which was used as an observation post by the defending Dutch forces during the siege of Ostend from 1601 to 1604. By the end of that century, the old city would become fully engulfed by the sea. Now a team of Flemish scientists believe they have found traces of the old city – or, at the very least, a harbour wall, buried just a few metres beneath the seabed. This discovery, they say, is an important historical find and a huge technological advancement, but also an illustration of climate change in action, demonstrating how rising sea levels have long threatened the Flemish coastline. “First of all, it’s part of our history,” says Hans Pirlet, geologist at the Flanders Marine Institute (Vliz). “It’s appealing to continued on page 5

\ CURRENT AFFAIRS

‘Too much spent on utilities’

Study shows more than 10% of households in Flanders can’t afford adequate heating Andy Furniere More articles by Andy \ flanderstoday.eu

ome 11% of Flemish families spent too much of their income on basic utilities in 2014, including water, electricity and heating. The figures come from the Yearbook on Poverty and Social Exclusion published by Antwerp University (UAntwerp). Every year, the university assembles scientific studies on poverty into one report. This year, the university focused on energy poverty, meaning families that cannot use heat or other forms of electricity sufficiently because of cost. Energy poverty increases the risk of health problems and social isolation. The report also shows that 3.4% of families spent less than half as much on energy as similar families – an indicator, said the university, of “hidden poverty”. More than 2% of households reported that they couldn’t afford to heat their

homes sufficiently. According to UAntwerp, the main cause of the phenomenon is the increase of energy prices. Energy bills have increased by 60% since 2007. The researchers have advised the government to offer more families the social energy rate, which is provided to those living below the poverty level. The researchers suggested that the government also offer the rate to people living on disability benefits in the short or long term. The report also shows that 10% of those eligible for the social rate aren’t taking advantage of it, so researchers also suggest that the government spearhead an information campaign. The Yearbook on Poverty and Social Exclusion can be downloaded at tinyurl.com/povertyyearbook.

VTM weather forecaster Jill Peeters wins Wablieft prize for clear language A TV weather forecaster has won the Wablieft prize for clear use of language, which is given each year to someone in the public eye. Jill Peeters, who works for commercial channel VTM, took the prize ahead of theatre in education group Theater van A tot Z, and Leen Haesaert, a researcher into accessible communication. “This is a pleasant form of recognition for my work,” Peeters said. “Some weeks ago Wablieft published their list of three possible winners, and I was happy to be on it. My mother thought I had already won. She bought me a bunch of flowers.” Wablieft is a website and newspaper written in simple Dutch. Originally published

wablieft.be

for those with reading disabilities, it has also embraced a Dutch-learning public. Peeters won principally as a result of her clear and simple explanations of meteorological phenomena and the importance of climate change. “This was no easy choice, as all three nominees were very strong,” the jury said. Wablieft began giving out the prize in 2007, when it went to Peeters’ fellow meteorologist Frank Deboosere of the public broadcaster VRT. Since then winners have included the socialist and Christian health insurers for their communications with clients, footballer Vincent Kompany and the Red Star Line Museum in Antwerp. \ Alan Hope

18% of young people in institutions put in solitary confinement Nearly 18% of youngsters staying in a juvenile institution in Flanders spent time in solitary confinement in 2015, according to statistics provided by welfare minister Jo Vandeurzen at the request of Het Nieuwsblad. Of the 1,413 youngsters who spent time in one of Flanders’ community institutions for troubled youth, nearly 250 were put in solitary confinement for varying periods of time. The isolation rooms are used to calm them down and keep them away from other residents. The rooms have furniture that is fixed to the floor and walls. “Youngsters only go to an isolation unit when their own safety or that of other youngsters and staff is endangered,” Peter Jan Bogaert of the Flemish agency for youth welfare told

VRT. “At such times, they are feeling out of control, and some even ask to be isolated because there is too much commotion around them.” Youngsters generally only spend a few hours in solitary, he said. Only very rarely would they be kept in an isolation unit for a whole day or multiple days. Het Nieuwsblad reported, however, that one girl, in the institution in Beernem, spent nine consecutive days in solitary confinement. Institutions vary in their use of isolation. About half of the youngsters in Beernem were put in an isolation unit at least once. “A number of incidents very close together can create a dangerous situation for a longer period,” explained Bogaert. \ AF

Flemish Catholic newspaper gets rare interview with pope each other. But he had a message for the youth of the world: “Don’t be afraid, don’t be ashamed of your faith. Tell it to the world. I advise young people two things: Seek new horizons and don’t throw your 20s away on superficial matters.” The Antwerp-based Tertio obtained the rare access to the pope on 16 November in the Vatican, where they spoke for 40 minutes. The atmosphere was friendly, the paper said, with moments of humour and no sense at all of being under pressure. “There was no sign of protocol or formalism,” the paper said in a statement. “No cardinals in sight, just a few security people and press officers. Tertio even forgot for a moment they were dealing with the Bishop of Rome, the direct successor of Saint Peter, so normal and familiar did Francis seem to be.” \ AH

Belgium’s most beautiful city is Bruges, according to Pope Francis, speaking in a rare interview published last week in the Flemish Catholic weekly Tertio. Jorge Mario Bergoglio visited Belgium frequently between 1973 and 1979 in his then function as provincial superior of the Society of Jesus in Argentina. “That’s when I started to fall in love with Belgium,” he told Tertio. “But for me the most beautiful city is not Ghent or Antwerp, but Bruges.” Though the pope is not planning to attend the commemoration of the end of the First World War in 2018, he did stress the dangers of another world war. “The slogan No More War has never been taken seriously,” he said, “and there is a lack of leaders who are progressive.” The world is suffering from a collective case of what he called “cardiosclerosis” – the hardening of hearts against

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8,800 new jobs to be created by the expansion of Nike warehouses in the Kempen area of Antwerp province, which already employ some 3,000 people, the company said

in real estate given by parents in Flanders to their children since the beginning of this year, with the revision of the tax rate. Children of owners pay only 3% on the gift, and other family members 10%

false bomb alerts in Brussels so far this year, including four in one day last week, compared to 93 in the whole of 2015. Targets vary from Vorst Nationaal concert venue to supermarkets and schools

jobs and €1.9 billion a year, the cost of counterfeit goods to Belgium, the economy minister said. The ministry and customs this year closed down nearly 3,000 websites selling fake goods

invested by Leuven-based bank KBC indirectly in the development of nuclear weapons between 2013 and 2016, according to a report published by pacifist organisation Pax

december 14, 2016

WEEK in brief Wouter van Bellingen, who in 2007 became Flanders’ first black city councillor, is stepping down from his current post as director of the Minorities Forum to work on the Flemish government’s Integration Pact, approved last summer. The pact pledges actors from the government, unions, employers and local authorities to combat racism and other forms of discrimination. The municipality of Elsene has opened Brussels’ first co-working hair and beauty salon. Les Coiffeuses de Bruxelles has eight spaces available for self-employed stylists to rent a space per hour or per month. Operator Camille Van Gestel opened a social hairdresser four years ago for people living on low incomes but had to close for lack of funding. Lode Aerts, the new bishop of Bruges appointed to take over from newly promoted cardinal Jozef De Kesel, has pledged to continue an investigation into two priests accused of sexual abuse whose cases have now passed the legal statute of limitations. The case concerns allegations of abuse at the Sacred Heart College in Waregem. The gold, eight-pointed “North Star”, sporting the rail system’s “B” logo, made a reappearance last week on the concourse of North Station in Brussels. The star, which has hung in North Station since the 1950s, was removed in 2014 for renovations. It was meant to move to the new Train World museum in Schaarbeek, but was restored to its traditional place after an effective social media campaign. As renovations are still ongoing, it will be February before it is visible to the public. TV actor Francesca Vanthielen (Aspe, LouisLouise) has taken the post of communications

face of flanders manager for Unia, formerly the government’s Centre for Equal Rights and the Fight against Racism. Vanthielen emerged as the best candidate from a selection process comprising written and oral tests organised by an external executive search bureau. For the first time in almost 40 years, the nativity scene in Grote Markt in Brussels does not feature live sheep, which have been replaced by artificial images. The decision was taken in agreement with the Lennik shepherd who has supplied the animals over the years. “I never made a penny,” he said. “On the contrary, I also had to supply the hay and the beets.” According to YouTube, the three most-watched videos in Belgium this year are Adele on James Corden’s Carpool Karaoke segment, the dancing Stormtrooper audition on Britain’s Got Talent and a display of freestyle football by Red Devil Kevin De Bruyne. Klaus Van Isacker has been confirmed as the new editor-inchief of Brussels media organisation Bruzz. Van Isacker has been acting editor since the group – which includes the former TV-Brussel, FM Brussel, Brussel Deze Week, Agenda and brusselnieuws.be – was reorganised under the name Bruzz earlier this year. People who own a second residence at the Flemish coast contribute 41% of the area’s tourism income, according to tourism agency Westtour. Owners of second houses and apartments, used both for visits by the owners and as rental properties, generate €1.1 billion in income from 94,200 residences, used for 21 million overnight stays. The largest number of units – about 20,000 – are located in Knokke-Heist.

Belgians are paying too much in restaurants and bars and for telecoms services Proximus and Telenet, compared to their counterparts in neighbouring countries. The comparative survey was carried out on the orders of federal consumer affairs minister Kris Peeters. Prices for goods and services in general in Belgium went up by an average of 1.5% from 2008 to 2016, compared to 1.1% in neighbouring countries, largely because of the sectors mentioned, where prices went up by about 25%. The calendar for the collection of rubbish in the Brussels-Capital Region will change on 2 January, Net Brussel has announced. After a test period of two years, the collection of paper and PMD will revert to weekly, with both blue and yellow bags picked up at the same time. White bags will continue to be picked up twice in a week. Despite two years of negotiations, unions remain opposed to an earlier start – 5.30 instead of 6.30 – for some crews. Unions warned of possible industrial action before the new schedule is in place. Beersel-based butcher chain Renmans, with hundreds of outlets across Belgium and Luxembourg, has filed a libel complaint against animal rights organisation Gaia, which accused the chain of supporting Argentina’s shocking practices in the slaughter of horses. As part of the campaign, video shows the horse slaughter being shown to Renmans customers. “We are still wondering what the precise link is between us and those images,” CEO Rik Renmans said. Armand Ell, the man who grew grapes in Brussels’ Josaphatpark to make wine he gave away for free, has died at the age of 88. Ell grew his vines on Schaarbeek municipal property and also gave guided tours, but he had to stop in 2010 when the municipality decided to install an organic kitchen garden.

OFFSIDE When you gotta go Imagine if you were out in public, at the Brussels Christmas market for example, and the biting cold and glühwein did their bit, and you had to go to the toilet, but there was a queue of 10,000 people in front of you. Wouldn’t that be frustrating? Well, that actually is the case, according to the youth wing of Christian democrats CD&V, which points out in a new campaign that Brussels has only one public toilet for every 10,000 people. The group compares that to Paris, which has one toilet per 450 residents. The Free Pipi campaign arrived

last week in the vicinity of SintKatelijneplein, with rubbish bins decorated with a toilet seat bearing the #freepipi hashtag. At the

Jean Bourgain At a televised event in San Francisco last week, closely resembling an Oscar ceremony, Ostend-born mathematician Jean Bourgain received the Breakthrough Prize in mathematics. Actor Morgan Freeman was the host of the event, and actor Jeremy Irons presented Bourgain with his trophy. The names of some of the creators of the Breakthrough Prize might also ring a bell: Google founder Sergey Brin and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, among others. The prize, worth $3 million (€2.8 million), rewards exceptional scientific performances and has been dubbed the “Silicon Valley Nobel Prize”. Bourgain, 62, received the award for his ground-breaking work in disciplines such as number theory, high-dimensional geometry and partial differential equations. That might sound complicated, and it is. “He is especially good at solving mathematical problems that are a mystery to others,” professor Dirk Huylebrouck of the University of Leuven told De Standaard. “Fewer than 100 people in the world understand his theories.” As a child, however, Bourgain didn’t seem to be a prodigy at all. He started speaking later than most children and didn’t get great marks in primary school. But when he was 15, one of his teachers discovered his mathematical

breakthroughprize.org

genius. From then on, things escalated quickly. At the age of 23, Bourgain had earned a PhD in mathematics at the Free University of Brussels (VUB). He became a full professor four years later. In 1985, he went to teach in France, but it was in the US that he found his ideal working space. For the last 22 years, Bourgain has worked at the prestigious Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, New Jersey, in the US. The institute was founded in 1930 and had Albert Einstein as one of its first professors. IAS is unique in that its scientists can focus completely on fundamental research, without pressure to publish or to give lectures. Among his many prizes and recognitions, Bourgain won the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences’ famed Crafoord Prize for mathematics in 2012. Last year, King Filip gave him the title of baron. The award ceremony was one of the scholar’s rare public appearances. When Huylebrouck once invited him to a scientific celebration, Bourgain answered: “A party? Mathematics is labour.” Bourgain is married and has a son, with whom he likes to play chess. In a statement published by the VUB, Bourgain thanked his family “for their love and continuous support over the years”. \ Andy Furniere

Flanders Today, a weekly English-language newspaper, is an initiative of the Flemish Region and is financially supported by the Flemish authorities.

centre of the campaign is an idea imported from Germany: Pay businesses like bars and restaurants a sum of money to brandish a sticker in their windows announcing their toilets can be used free of charge. This would lead to hundreds more public toilets, without needing to construct a single one. According to the website CityLab, German cities have saved some serious money: Bremen claims to save €1 million a year for an outlay of €168,000 – a little less than €0.34 per resident per year. A small price to pay for guaranteed relief wherever you go. \ Alan Hope

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 Bartosz Brzezi´nski Agenda Robyn Boyle, Georgio Valentino Art director Paul Van Dooren Prepress Mediahuis AdPro Contributors Rebecca Benoot, Derek Blyth, Leo Cendrowicz, Emma Davis, Paula Dear, Andy Furniere, Lee Gillette, Diana Goodwin, Clodagh Kinsella, Catherine Kosters, Toon Lambrechts, Ian Mundell, Anja Otte, Tom Peeters, Arthur Rubinstein, Senne Starckx, Christophe Verbiest, Denzil Walton General manager Hans De Loore Publisher Mediahuis NV

Editorial address Gossetlaan 30 - 1702 Groot-Bijgaarden tel 02 467 23 06 editorial@flanderstoday.eu subscriptions tel 03 560 17 49 subscriptions@flanderstoday.eu or order online at www.flanderstoday.eu Advertising 02 467 24 37 advertising@flanderstoday.eu Verantwoordelijke uitgever Hans De Loore

\ POLITICS

5TH COLUMN Campaigning coalition

The federal government has been caught up in what has become known as the visa incident. Secretary of state for migration, Theo Francken (N-VA), has refused to grant a humanitarian visa to a Syrian family from Aleppo who have a Belgian family willing to provide their financial support. A court has stated – twice – that the visa should be granted, imposing penalties of €4,000 for every day that it is not. To Francken’s party, the discussion is fundamental. Giving in would mean that anyone can demand a visa from any Belgian embassy abroad. This could quickly become an uncontrollable migration channel. Another reason for N-VA to object to the judgement is that it sees it as a prelude to a “government of judges”. So the nationalist party has started an aggressive social media campaign in which it refers to the judges as “out of touch”. This has angered other politicians, who see it as an attack on the rule of law. CD&V, N-VA’s coalition partner and the party of federal justice minister Koen Geens, has strongly objected to N-VA’s stance, as have liberals Open VLD, the other Flemish coalition party, which even likened the campaign to methods employed by Dutch far-right politician Geert Wilders. N-VA president Bart De Wever has said that there will be “a major political problem” should the judgement be confirmed in appeal. Read: the federal government could fall. The federal government has been lacking cohesion since the recent budget talks, in which CD&V demanded a capital gains tax as a trade-off for lower business taxes. In a remarkable move, CD&V viceprime minister Kris Peeters disappeared from the negotiations, forcing prime minister Charles Michel to postpone his annual State of the Union. In fact, this government is a disappointment to all involved. N-VA failed to produce the “economic change” it promised. CD&V has been marginalised and has become the “quarrelling party”. Like Open VLD, its polls are low. Which leaves all three parties at a loss. What we are witnessing now could be the end of play, with coalition parties campaigning, rather than governing. CD&V hopes to make fair taxation the main issue in a new federal election. To Open VLD that would be “freedom” from a patronising government. N-VA, meanwhile, is focusing on migration and security, all the more important since the far-right Vlaams Belang is back on the rise . \ Anja Otte

Parliament hearings held on protecting whistle-blowers

Ombudsman reports officials discouraged from expressing concerns Alan Hope Follow Alan on Twitter \ @AlanHopeFT

he Flemish parliament’s Administrative Affairs committee last week held hearings on the protection of government whistleblowers, or employees who bring to light government mismanagement. The hearing was a result of Flemish ombudsman Bart Weekers’ 2015 annual report, which dealt with whistle-blowers’ rights to protection. According to the report, “senior officials need to be seen to value the right of civil servants to speak out, rather than discourage it”. Weekers (pictured) said that he had often been approached by government employees reporting that their superiors had made it clear that

management were not happy when employees spoke out. The committee also considered the ombudsman’s proposal for the protection of whistleblowers in the welfare and education sectors, as well as other areas which are substantially subsidised by the government. The list of those invited to give evidence included Bernard Hubeau, former ombudsman and the instigator of the right to protection; Martin Ruebens, secretary-general of the Flemish government’s chancellery department; and Judith Jeurissen of the Huis van de klokkenluiders (Whistle-Blowers’ House) in Utrecht.

Government returns from economic mission to Houston

Ministers react to ruling on Syrian family’s humanitarian visa

The port of Antwerp’s largest logistics company has opened the world’s largest terminal for polymer plastics in the port of Houston, Texas, in the US. The opening of the Katoen Natie terminal follows a royal trade mission to the US state led by Princess Astrid and including Flemish minister-president Geert Bourgeois. “We’ll be investing €420 million a year, and most of it will go to the US,” said Katoen Natie CEO Fernand Huts said. “We’ll be building in Dallas and Baton Rouge as well as Houston.” Bourgeois stressed the importance of the bond between Flanders and the US: about one million Americans are of Flemish origin, he said, while the US is the most important non-EU investor in Flanders. The government has several goals, he explained: maintaining the US as a strategic partner for trade and inward investment, working more closely on research and innovation, cultural co-operation, attracting the US as a market for tourism and making the name of Flanders more recognisable to the American public. \ AH

Ministers have reacted to a tribunal’s judgement that a Syrian family seeking asylum in Belgium must be granted a humanitarian visa. Last week, the tribunal for disputes in policy for foreigners ordered state secretary for migration and asylum Theo Francken to issue a visa to a family from Aleppo. The visa would allow them to come to Belgium to be reunited with friends here, who are pledging financial support. The judgement was supported by the Brussels court of appeal. As members of Francken’s party, N-VA, described the appeal court judges as “out of touch”, prime minister Charles Michel (MR) pointed out the matter was still part of a court procedure, with a question before the European Court of Justice in Strasbourg. Michel and Geens were joined by Open VLD president Gwendolyn Rutten in condemning the words of Francken and N-VA party president, Bart De Wever, who had complained of “government by

Coalition parties against proposal to pay for years of study towards pension A proposal to allow people to pay into their future pension fund for the years spent in higher education has been struck down by federal coalition parties N-VA and CD&V. The proposal was made by pension minister Daniel Bacquelaine of French-speaking coalition party MR. In order to claim a full pension in Belgium, people need to have worked for 45 years, but former students often must work past pension age to reach that number. They have the option to “regularise” years spent in university or college by paying €1,500 per study year, but that must happen within 10 years of the final year of study. After that period, the rate increases significantly. Government employees’ study years are automatically regularised as counting toward work years, without having to pay. Bacquelaine’s proposal would have harmonised conditions across the workforce, including the self-employed, meaning government employees would also have had to pay to regularise

study years. During a three-year transition period, everyone – regardless of when they graduated – could pay for their student years at the same price. In 2017 and 2018, there would be an additional discount of 10%, and the payment would be taxdeductible. The coalition parties’ concerns were with the unpredictable budgetary outcome. Public response to such an opportunity, according to N-VA and CD&V, would likely be enthusiastic. The more people that sign up for it, the greater the financial impact on the federal budget in the long term. The plan is a “sale and lease-back, with the bill going to the next generation,” said MP Zuhal Demir (N-VA). “As far as I’m concerned, this measure will never pass, not without the guarantee that the younger generation, who have not been consulted, will not be affected.” She was joined by MP Robrecht Bothuyne (CD&V), who described the measure as “passing the budgetary buck”. \ AH

Prime minister Charles Michel (left) and migration secretary Theo Francken

judges”. She asked why members of the public should respect the decisions of judges if politicians did not. “Imagine what would happen if everyone said, ‘we’re going to ignore the judgements of the courts’,” she said. The Aleppo family’s case is now before the Council of State, as well as the European Court. The question of whether a family from a foreign country may apply for a humanitarian visa to allow it to seek asylum in an EU member state is of crucial importance, all parties agree, not only to Belgium but to all EU countries. \ AH

Children’s rights commissioner on visit to South Africa and Mozambique Bruno Vanobbergen, Flanders’ commissioner for children’s rights, has completed a visit to South Africa and Mozambique, during which he met with various government representatives, NGOs and other organisations. The purpose of the trip was to exchange views on the recognition and implementation of the rights of children. The visit also included talks with the United Nations organisation Unicef, the South African justice department and the country’s Human Rights Commission on the legal framework for children’s rights. At the request of the Center for Child Law at the University of Pretoria, Vanobbergen gave a lecture on the importance of the introduction of a national ombudsman for children’s rights. Save the Children then gave Vanobbergen a guided tour of an exhibition on violence against children, including a discussion on how to tackle the problem. In Mozambique, the commissioner discussed the problem of violence against children and women and the urgent need for a legal framework for children’s rights. \ AH

\ COVER STORY

december 14, 2016

City beneath the sea

Ruins of mediaeval Ostend offer window into past and warning for the future

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know about where we live. But it can also be seen in the framework of the whole debate about rising sea levels. We have this notion that our settlements have always been fixed in place, but this discovery may contribute to the awareness that the coastline is always changing.” The old Ostend is well-documented on maps from the period, but the quest to find it only became a serious possibility thanks to the recent developments in acoustic technology. Known as a multi-transducer parametric sub-bottom profiler – and trademarked as the SES Quattro – the new technology provides 3D images of relief buried under the seabed. A team of researchers at Ghent University’s marine geology department tested the SES Quattro in 2015, taking images of known peat extraction sites off the coast of Raversyde, near Ostend. According to Tine Missiaen, who led the project, the experiment gave “fabulous results”. There have always been a lot of people talking about the lost city of Ostend, she adds. “We thought, ‘okay, let’s use the instrument there’.” The explorations at Ostend are part of a larger project called SeArch, which was led by Missiaen and aimed to find a cost-effective methodology for evaluating archaeological sites in the North Sea. Belgian waters are home to more than 250 shipwrecks, submarines, aircraft and smaller archaeological artefacts such as ceramics and weapons. Exploring the waters in such close proximity to the coast is more challenging due to the incoming and outgoing tides, and that’s why more advanced technology was so crucial. But the project needed money. Luckily, it caught the attention of Vliz, which aims to protect the marine environment, including its heritage. After seeing the SES Quattro in action, the institute decided to obtain the equipment – at a cost of some €200,000 – for the use of all research institutes in Flanders. “With this technology, we are pushing the limits of underwater acoustic imaging,” says Missiaen. “Previously we could only obtain images at a much lower resolution. It’s a big technological step forward.” Last summer, the scientists hopped into small boats to take their images. “We were working as close to the shore as possible,” says Missiaen. “At high tide, the water would go from half a metre to three metres in depth. There were also a lot of people swimming in the area.” Working in such changing waters, known as an inter-tidal zone where the land is dry at certain points in the day, is challenging because of the limited time during which scientists can take their images. An added factor, the scientists joke, is that the North Sea is nothing like the crystal-clear tropical oceans, with its murky waters reducing visibility to near zero. Nevertheless, the team hit the jackpot. The images obtained so far show what the scientists believe to be a harbour channel and a wall. “You can see regular patterns that cannot be attributed to anything other than human activity,” says Pirlet. After months of extensive labour – and increasing costs – the scientists are elated. “We found what we had expected, so the discovery doesn’t come as a complete

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By the end of the 16th century, the entire Ter Streep island – seen in the northern portion of the map – was engulfed by the sea; exploring North Sea waters so close to shore is a major challenge because of incoming and outgoing tides

surprise,” says Pirlet. “But, naturally, we are happy and relieved that something really interesting came out of the project. There’s also a lot of interest from the general public. We are over the moon.” The finding helps give credibility to marine archaeology in the public eye, says the geologist. “We are able to visualise the old city and bring it back to life with concrete images. Underwater heritage is very interesting, but you have to translate it for the general public.” It’s also prompting international interest. In Denmark, local scientists have begun examining structures in the inter-tidal waters, and

predicted a sea-level rise of one metre by 2100. This would result in a flooding of the coastline between De Panne and Ostend. The discovery of the old Ostend provides proof of the constant erosion and impact of rising sea levels, say the scientists, and should provide some much-needed impetus for action on climate change. “The old town of Ostend is clear evidence of rising sea levels as far back as the 16th century,” says Marnix Pieters, director of archaeological research at the Flanders Heritage Agency. “Some people don’t believe that the rising sea levels are a reality, and, as

You can see regular patterns that cannot be attributed to anything other than human activity there are discussions about a similar project in Venice, where rising sea levels are a cause for alarm. The research method could also be used to ensure that no marine heritage is disturbed by the maritime and shipping industries. In addition to its historic and scientific significance, say the scientists, the project carries a crucial message on climate change: Rising sea levels must not be ignored. Work is already under way along the Flemish coast to create reinforcements to prevent the repeat of the 1953 North Sea flood, which devastated many coastal areas. But the regional authorities warn that some parts of the coastline are still inadequately protected. Last year, a team of architects

a consequence, don’t realise that something should be done. In that respect, archaeology can help raise awareness.” According to Missiaen, the discovery could also contribute to further analysis about how quickly the coastline is being affected by climate change and the rising sea levels and storms. “If we can understand how fast things have changed,” she says, “it might be easier to understand how climate change will continue to affect us.” For now, Missiaen’s team is busy taking more images of the submerged site and expects to have some more exciting news in the coming months. Eventually, the scientists hope to find remnants of old houses and fortifications. Much will depend on whether these

were constructed out of wood, which would have washed away by now, or the more durable stone. If the structures aren’t buried too deep, further exploration could involve digging, where samples are taken using cores drilled into the ground. Another option is to use magnetometry, a technology that detects magnetic fields around the objects, allowing scientists to compose charts and maps of buried structures. The heritage agency, meanwhile, hopes for further exploration using those techniques, so that the data can be compared to the findings on land. For Pieters, the most exciting part about the discovery is that there is still hope that the old structures could be examined from an archaeological perspective. Today, parts of the island are still visible from the shore. Known affectionately as the “Queen of the Belgian coast”, Ostend can now boast that it’s home to a revolution in archaeological research. To Missiaen this is a crucial achievement. “Everyone wants to know where they come from.”

\ BUSINESS

week in business Chemicals Solvay The Brussels-based chemical group is selling its Acetow affiliate, the world’s fourth largest producer of cellulose acetate tow, used in cigarette filters, for €1 billion to the US-based Blackstone investment fund.

Textiles Sioen The producer of coated textiles and protective gear, based in Ardooie, West Flanders, is paying €22 million to acquire Finland’s Ursuit company, specialised in wetsuits and drysuits.

Retail Asics The Japanese chain of sport equipment and apparel has opened a flagship store in Brussels, the first in Europe that combines retail with on-the-spot equipment testing facilities. The company expects to roll out the new concept in Antwerp, Paris and Berlin in the coming months.

Banking KBC Flanders’ largest financial institution has made an offer to acquire the United Bulgarian Bank (UBB) in partnership with Hungary’s OTP Bank. UBB is Bulgaria’s fourth largest bank and is owned by the National Bank of Greece. The move heralds KBC’s return to the acquisition trail in Central and Eastern Europe following its bailout by the federal government during the financial crisis.

Transport Flixbus The German low-cost bus company is launching a Leuven-to-London service for €17, in addition to its existing operation in Brussels. The new line will connect with services to four destinations in Germany, including Munich, and four in the Netherlands.

Air Luxaviation The Luxembourg-based business aviation company, which operates 260 jets throughout Europe, has inaugurated a €4 million hangar at KortrijkWevelgem airport to accommodate up to 15 business jets. The company already operates from Brussels, Antwerp and Charleroi.

Development City 2 A €40 million renovation project is set to begin in the middle of next year on the 50,000 square-metre shopping centre in the centre of Brussels.

Dutch-Flemish co-operation funds transport, education

Cross-border scheme invests €4.2m to boost employment and training Alan Hope Follow Alan on Twitter \ @AlanHopeFT

nterreg Flanders-Netherlands, the crossborder programme to finance initiatives for green and intelligent growth, has announced a €4.2 million subsidy for two projects – one in transport and logistics and one in education. The programme is part of the European Union’s fund for regional development and covers three Dutch provinces – Zeeland, North Brabant and Limburg – and all five Flemish provinces. The new project Syn-Ergie concerns road freight transport in the area stretching from Dutch Limburg to West Flanders, taking in Antwerp. Freight transport is still heavily dependent on road traffic, and 97% dependent on fossil fuels. The goal of Syn-Ergie is to

improve loads on lorries and promote alternative means of transport, including rail and inland waterways. The Border-free Bio-based Education project, meanwhile, operates in the Scheldt Delta area of Flanders and Zeeland province in the Netherlands. The area has a high concentration

of agriculture and chemical concerns, but a shortage of technically qualified workers is hampering economic growth. The project aims to improve the link between education and businesses in the biotechnology sector, which uses genetic and molecular material in industrial processes. This will help provide individuals with the skills required for future innovation. Border-free Education will also create a network of teachers who can be deployed across the area, as well as a digital platform for educators, students and companies. The announcement of these two latest Interreg Flanders-Netherlands projects brings the total number of projects financed to 32, for a value of nearly €83 million.

Users of Brussels car parks down by 30%, says Interparking

Dutch post rejects third and final bid from Belgium’s Bpost

The lack of a coherent mobility policy in Brussels is causing potential shoppers to go to other cities, according to Roland Cracco, the director of Interparking, which runs car parks in 70 towns and cities across the country. Occupancy rates in Brussels have decreased by between 30% and 40% over the last two years, he said, while numbers increased in other cities, including Aalst, Antwerp and Ghent. “Various factors play a part,” Cracco told Bruzz. “First, the pedestrianisation of parts of Brussels. Then, obviously, the terrorist attacks not only in Brussels but also in Paris, followed by the lock-down. And thirdly, you have the closure of some important tunnels.” The switch by motorists from Brussels to other towns is a sign, according to the UCM union, that consumers are adapting their shopping behaviour. For Interparking, though, the movement is not temporary. The situation in Paris, he said, was restored to normal much faster. “That the reduction in Brussels isn’t changing is the result of the lack of a mobility policy,” Cracco said. “Policy-makers need to be less ideological and more practical about mobility. Never mind the slogans; what’s needed is a concrete approach to tackling problems.” \ AH

A third – and reputedly final – offer by Belgium’s national postal service, Bpost, to take over Dutch postal service PostNL has been rejected. Other offers were made and rejected last month. According to Bpost CEO Koen Van Gerven, it was Dutch political influence that sank the deal. “On the Belgian side, the government behaved rationally, like any other shareholder, and stayed out of the debate,” he said in an interview with Trends magazine. “The Dutch have nothing to teach us there. During this period I have felt more interference from Dutch politicians than during my whole career in Belgium.” The problems started, he said, with the leak of a confidential working document to the Dutch Financieele Dagblad ahead of the original bid. That undermined any attempt to keep the talks private. “The public square is no place to discuss a transaction like that.” The improved third bid for PostNL, which Bpost said would be its

National Bank predicts 120,000 new jobs by 2019 The Belgian economy is looking forward to the creation of 120,000 jobs over the next three years, according to the National Bank of Belgium’s (NBB) latest forecast. Some 55,000 jobs have been created this year, and the NBB expects growth to be maintained or surpassed over the next three years, with the private sector picking up much of the job creation. Job creation from the public sector is forecast to fall for the first time in more than 20 years. NBB governor Jan Smets described 2016 as a “grand cru” – the term used in the wine making trade to describe an exceptional harvest. The number of jobs created, he said, was the result of government decisions, including skipping the indexation of wages and other measures to bring Belgium into line with its neighbours in terms of competition.

last, offered €5.75 a share. It was rejected unanimously by the board and the governing council, with the statement that they were “not convinced that a combination of Bpost and PostNL would be successful”. PostNL fears that a Belgian takeover would lead the Dutch government to turn over the contract for mail delivery to someone else. They also fear that employment in the Netherlands might be affected. The postal carrier also expressed misgivings over the complex management structure of Bpost and the possible influence of the majority shareholder, the Belgian government. \ AH

Mini-Europe to stay at Heizel in new Neo shopping centre

The growth in overall employment is larger than the growth of the population, with the result that unemployment is forecast to fall from 8.2% nationally to 7.6% by 2019 – 56,000 fewer unemployed people in 2019 than in 2015. \ AH

Mini-Europe, the theme park at Heizel in Brussels that contains miniatures of European landmarks, will be kept in the new Neo shopping and leisure centre planned for the site. The water park Océade will remain open until at least October 2018. “We can guarantee [Mini-Europe’s] activities on the site, with an eye on new attractions planned for Neo,” said Yvan Mayeur, mayor of BrusselsCity, which owns the site. Neo, however, has no place for Océade, said Philippe Close, Brussels councillor in charge of tourism, who is also chair of Brussels Expo, the nonprofit behind the Neo project. The agreement with Océade allows it to stay as long as possible without hindering the building plans. “I’m happy to be able to tell staff that they will be able to carry on for longer,” said Thierry Meeus, CEO of the company that operates both attractions. Océade was originally due to close at the end of this year. \ AH

\ INNOVATION

december 14, 2016

For your eyes only

week in innovation

Privacy is key for companies leading medical tech revolution Senne Starckx More articles by Senne \ flanderstoday.eu

BEWELLINNOVATIONS.COM

edical technology is a booming business. Personalised medicine and telemonitoring are two evolutions that are currently reshaping the health-care landscape in Flanders, and a local company is making sure the data gathered from patients is stored with care . Patients, whether recovering in a hospital bed, visiting their GP, consulting a specialist, receiving care from a nurse at home or just following a prescribed regime, are going to be dealing more and more with all sorts of devices and apps. That smart technology will be able to register basic health information such as blood pressure, heart rhythm and cholesterol levels automatically, so caregivers can concentrate on more complex tasks. For IT companies with a feeling for medical technology, the need for these devices and the accompanying software represents a huge business opportunity. But only those firms that succeed in matching their products and services with the data culture in health care – where privacy is king – will get there. Even though we throw a large part of our privacy out of the window nowadays through using services like Facebook and Google, we’re still very reluctant to share some of our most private information: medical records. The federal government hasn’t yet decided who should keep and guard that data. But with the digitisation of public health care increasing, there’s an urgent need for an efficient and watertight system. In the meantime, individual hospitals or groups of hospitals are managing our electronic healthcare records. These institutions

BeWell’s kiosk enables patients to measure basic parameters like blood pressure just before they consult a specialist

apply the most stringent privacy standards to private companies that are paving the way towards the digital future, insisting that the latter may not inspect the data they handle. “Excluding every third party in the data flows we handle is one of our strongest assets,” says Joris Wille, CEO of BeWell Innovations, a Flemish medtech company that specialises in connected medical technology for telemonitor-

and the other enabling telemonitoring. The first product, a point-of-care self-testing “kiosk”, has been implemented in several hospitals, including in Leuven and Antwerp. The kiosk enables patients to measure basic parameters like their blood pressure just before they consult a specialist. In the oncology department of Leuven’s University Hospital, which deals with about 200

No third party – not even us – has access to patient information ing and patient self-testing. “Our devices send the data directly to the point of care’s electronic data file, meaning no third party – not even us – has access to patient information.” BeWell, founded in 2010, has two products in its shop window: one promoting hospital care efficiency

patients a day, this resulted in a saving of 10 hours a day. “This means that oncologists can spend more time on other, more complex aspects of a patient’s disease,” says Wille. The company’s second product allows physicians to remotely monitor patients with chronic

diseases through self-testing at home. “We incorporated this solution into a user-friendly app that runs on every smartphone,” explains Wille. “There’s a cloudbased platform that gathers the information sent by the app and enables physicians to evaluate the patient’s condition.” Again, Wille insists that his company doesn’t intervene in the relationship between patient and physician. “The hospital and the caregivers look after the medical side, we take care of the technical side.” Wille acknowledges that it’s common today in business circles to equate big data with big money. “But if you want to realise sustainable growth, you have to earn the confidence of the data providers and respect the privacy regulation.” Nevertheless, it looks like funding is finding its way to Wille’s company, which is based in Ranst, Antwerp province, and employs seven people. Ark Angels Activator Fund (AAAF), a Hasseltbased venture capitalist fund, has decided to invest. Human capital is flowing towards the company, too, as two “business angels” will reinforce the team with their personal business expertise. These are former entrepreneurs who are sent by BAN Vlaanderen, a government agency that aims to encourage contact between starting or growing companies and private investors. “We’ve been caught out a bit by our fast growth,” Wille admits. “So we really need to scale up the company in a short period of time. The investment from AAAF is worth €1 million, and this will certainly help us to stay on course to capture the Flemish market.”

Q&A The government should also allocate larger budgets for digital inclusion projects. The city of Ghent has set a good example with its Digitaal.Talent@ Gent programme, in which all the city councillors are involved in creating e-inclusion policy. The project also enables closer collaboration with civil society organisations.

Ilse Mariën is a researcher at the Smit centre at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) and co-author of the new book Allemaal digitaal? (Everyone Digital?), a blueprint for creating an effective e-inclusion policy in an increasingly digitalised society You write that we have to get ready for a “digital boom”. What do you mean? The goal of the Flemish government is to make public services completely digital by 2020, so we have to ensure that everyone is ready for that. All aspects of our society are becoming “smarter”, through digital innovations like household applications that are linked with each other. Urban environments are transformed into “smart cities”, through the intelligent use of technology.

What groups are at risk of being excluded? Digital skills are necessary in all aspects of life, from arranging your finances to applying for jobs. These days, even home schooling requires a certain level of digital skills. The obvious answer to who is at risk of exclusion is the elderly, but there are also many younger people who cannot keep up with the changes. Among many couples, one of the partners takes up the task of dealing with digital matters, but that can lead to problems if they can’t do it anymore. There

are also cases of high-profile managers and policymakers who rely on their secretaries for something as basic as writing emails. What is your message to the Flemish government? Make e-inclusion every minister’s responsibility, putting the minister for equal opportunities, Liesbeth Homans, in the driver’s seat.

What’s your involvement on the federal level? We are developing a country-wide e-inclusion strategy through IDEALiC. At the moment, we are assembling information on organisations that specialise in relevant areas, to see how they can co-operate on sustainable e-inclusion. There is an obvious need for a clear vision for the future.

Astronomers predict Earth’s extinction An international team of astronomers, including researchers from the University of Leuven, is investigating a star called L2 Puppis to get an idea of what will happen to Earth in billions of years. In an article published in Astronomy & Astrophysics, the researchers predict that in five billion years, the sun will have grown into a red giant star, more than 100 times larger than it is now. But because of a strong stellar wind, the sun will be reduced to a white dwarf star about the size of the Earth two billion years after that. This evolution will have a dramatic impact on the solar system, destroying Mercury and Venus, and wiping out any form of life on Earth.

205 drone pilots certified this year Just over 200 drone pilots have been certified in Flanders this year, with about half coming from Antwerp province, according to figures from the federal government’s mobility department. While permits are not required to fly drones that weigh less than one kilogram, are never flown higher than 10 metres and are used on private property, larger drones or those used on public property, such as a drone flying area, require permits obtained via written and practical examinations, developed by the government. There are several education programmes available to study for the drone test, which are evaluated by the Belgian Unmanned Aircraft System Association.

Medieval convent unearthed in Antwerp Archaeologists in Antwerp have unearthed the remains of a medieval convent dating back to the 14th century. The convent, founded on what is now the Falconplein, was the home of the Falcontinnen nuns. It was demolished in 1810 after the number of nuns dwindled at the end of the 18th century, and the site was later taken over by military barracks. Previous works uncovered the presbytery and the foundations of some buildings to the north of the original site. The current dig has unearthed the remains of the convent chapel, parts of the cloister and other buildings including the kitchens. The works have also uncovered about 30 graves.

\ Interview by Andy Furniere

\ EDUCATION

december 14, 2016

Screen smarts

week in education

Online safety survey prompts concern among local teachers

Flanders is one of the world’s best regions for education, according to the latest Programme for International Student Assessment, a global study conducted every three years by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Flanders’ scores put it among the frontrunners in the world. For maths, Flemish 15-year-olds are the highest in Europe and fifth worldwide. In sciences, the region achieved 10th place globally and third in Europe, while in literacy, it is in ninth place in the world and fifth in Europe. However, the study shows that 17% of the participating Flemish students don’t have the minimum capacities to be independent in society and aren’t achieving the basic level for maths, sciences and literacy.

Emma Portier Davis More articles by Emma \ flanderstoday.eu

survey that concludes Belgian children are “reckless and ruthless” when it comes to their online lives is prompting concern among Flemish educators, who question whether schools can do more to teach kids about the dangers. The survey was conducted by Kaspersky Lab, which makes internet security software. It questioned more than 5,000 children in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. Belgian kids were found to be more likely than their peers in other countries to have seen pornography online, according to Kaspersky, and were also more likely to post something mean about someone on social media after a disagreement. While some doubt whether the survey is broad enough and whether Belgian kids really are much different from their peers, the message to come out of the survey is still a worrying one, according to children’s groups. “In any event, the results from this survey are alarming,” says Sofie De Cupere, media coach at education network GO! Vlaanderen. “Hopefully this will help to highlight the importance of IT literacy and help us put it back in the spotlight.” A positive point to come out of the survey is that Belgian children are more IT literate in general than their peers in other countries surveyed. Even where parental controls exist, children are incredibly adept at finding their way around them.

Parents install blocks so their kids don’t see stuff, but the kids know exactly how to get past them “When parents install blocks to make sure their kids don’t see stuff, the kids know exactly how to get past them,” says Martijn Van Lom of Kaspersky. “There is a huge skills gap between the kids and the grown-ups when it comes to IT.” The survey also found that Belgian children were more likely to admit to being nervous about their online life and the consequences of what they post now on social media when they are older – again showing a high degree of digital compre-

Parents and schools have to work together to increase children’s IT literacy – a skill that is becoming as important as reading and writing

hension. Other studies also show that Belgian children have strong IT skills and can perform many related tasks well. An EU-wide inquiry also showed that risks are not synonymous with damage. Nevertheless, educators and children’s groups are keen to push forward programmes to make sure kids are learning as much as they can to lead a safe online life and to avoid the risks. “We are tending towards a society where there is no difference between the real world and the internet,” says Dirk Depover, spokesperson for Child Focus. “This is, of course, a big challenge to the educational system as a whole. We have to be prepared.” There is already a series of programmes under way to teach children in school about safe internet use. The most crucial of these is the government initiative Mediawijs (Media Literate). Many schools also have access to a media coach for training. But the fast pace of internet developments makes it hard for teachers. “Many teachers themselves are a bit lost,” says Depover. “A 40-year-old teaching in a high school probably didn’t know anything about this when they were growing up.” De Cupere says schools are trying to address the problem even if there is still “too little” attention being paid to the matter right now. “We have to show them that digital literacy is as important as reading and writing to function in our society,

today and in the future. Sometimes colleagues consider this topic to be too much additional work. It is often not considered a priority. That is now gradually changing.” Though there is a clear role for schools, experts agree that parents must also take up the baton in the fight to keep kids safer online. Filters are good, they say, but an outright ban is a step in the wrong direction. “This has to be done by talking to your kids,” says Depover. “Parents have to make sure that internet use is part of family life. Ask them what they posted on Instagram and who they talked to on Facebook. Ask them if it was a pleasant conversation.” Experts agree that parents should also use the apps themselves so that they understand how they work and can explain to their kids about privacy settings. Depover adds that parents must create trust. “Never rely on filters. They are not 100% reliable.” As for meeting strangers online, he says: “We shouldn’t spread anxiety. There’s not a paedophile on every street corner. But we do have to give the message that you have to be critical when you meet someone on the internet.” With such a rapid evolution of technology, the message from educators is clear: Whatever we do will never be enough. Depover, though, is optimistic: “If we all do our best, we will succeed, even if we will always be a little bit behind.”

Flemish pupils keen on overseas internships Increasing numbers of pupils from Flemish technical and professional education are taking part in internships abroad via the Erasmus+ programme, the EU’s student mobility project. About 1,400 students took part in the scheme in 2016, which is about 10 times the number at the start of the project in 1995. In total, 188 teachers were involved. Such an internship lasts between two weeks and six months, and students and teachers get financial support in the form of a grant. The most popular destinations for Flemish students are France, the UK and Spain. Flemish education minister Hilde Crevits announced the statistics as part of the first

Flemish pupils Europe’s best at maths

European Vocational Skills Week, which took place from 5 to 9 December. On Friday, Crevits distributed mobility charters to six schools in Flanders that have been organising successful internships for several years. The charters give schools access to a simplified application process. “Through Erasmus+, youngsters acquire skills that employers value,” Crevits said. “Tolerance, self-confidence, curiosity, problem-solving thinking and multilingualism.” Participants receive a Europass Mobility certificate at the end of their internship, which lists the knowledge and skills they have acquired abroad. This can increase their chances of success in job applications. \ Andy Furniere

More funds needed for special education The Catholic education and community education networks are calling for more money to carry out the M decree, introduced last year to move more children with a learning disorder or disability from special education into regular education. The networks support the principle of the decree but feel the situation is unsustainable without extra investment. Lieven Boeve, head of the Catholic education network, said that the government of Flanders had promised extra financial support but has not provided it. Education minister Hilde Crevits said the M decree will be evaluated next year and that support for students will be organised more flexibly.

KU Leuven reminds students to move more The University of Leuven (KU Leuven) is asking students to interrupt lessons every half an hour to remind their classmates to stretch their legs. The idea of nominating a “standing secretary” is to reduce health problems linked to spending too long sitting down. Professors are advised to encourage students to make extra movements, like walking up stairs, after an hour of lessons. They might also ask students to change seats every hour. Sitting still for more than eight hours a day increases the risk of developing conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Experts advise standing up for at least one minute after each half-hour of sitting down, to improve the blood flow. \ AF

\ LIVING

week in activities Food Truck Fiesta As part of Leuven’s winter festival, an army of food trucks will be parked in De Bruul Park throughout the weekend, serving unique, homemade and international fare. Also check out the Christmas market on Ladeuzeplein and the winter garden on the Grote Markt. 16-18 December, Park De Bruul, Raoul Claesstraat, Leuven; free \ wintertijdinleuven.be/events

The Warmest Weekend

The city of Mechelen celebrates the season with a fun waterside festival for young and old. Enjoy the holiday atmosphere with local and handmade products, food and drink, and an arts festival and craft workshops for kids on Friday evening. On Sunday, stop by the international craft market inside the Lamot congress centre. 16-18 December, Haverwerf, Mechelen; free \ mechelenhoudtjewarm.be

Almost Longest Night As the winter solstice approaches, it’s time to gather together with a programme of community-minded activities. Choose from lectures and debates, workshops for kids, a repair cafe, book exchange and a second-hand swap meet. The day closes with a charity concert featuring John Joris, Joost Zweegers and Stijn Meuris. 17 December, across Hasselt, infostand on Molenpoortplein; free \ debijnalangstenacht.be

Dickens Days Travel back in time to the world of Charles Dickens. Bilzen’s city centre becomes a giant stage for 150 costumed performers, bringing Victorian London to life, with a bit of steampunk and romance. There’s a Dickensian market, musical acts, food and drink, light show and more. 17-18 December, Bilzen (Limburg); free \ facebook.com/dickens16

Winter Wonder Castle In the winter, the Gravensteen Castle in Ghent becomes the warmest place in the city, with seasonal decorations and a programme of special events. Enter the fairy-tale world of Swan Lake, enjoy an afternoon concert or have a drink at the Winter Bar. 17 December to 8 January, Het Gravensteen, Ghent; €10 \ gravensteen.stad.gent

\ 10

Game to eat

Wildlife is carefully managed to ensure local specialities every winter Dan Smith More articles by Dan \ flanderstoday.eu

NATUURENBOS.BE

ith autumn nearing an end, you may have noticed the ubiquitous “wild” signs appearing in restaurants and butchers around Belgium. For those who enjoy the strong flavours of wild game, this is the signal that it’s open season for hunting. Wild is a term that covers a range of huntable animals in Belgium such as deer, boar and birds, including partridge, ducks and pheasant. The list is highly regulated to ensure that wildlife is managed sustainably and to prevent damage to land set aside for farming and nature. “Both aspects require thoughtful and methodical game management,” says Marie-Laure Vanwanseele, communications director at the Agency for Nature and Woodlands (ANB), which supervises hunting in Flanders. “Hunters must have a wildlife management plan that covers the objectives and management measures for wild animals.” They must also comply with the borders of each individual hunting ground, which can also be part of the so-called game management unit. These are voluntary partnerships between the holders of individual hunting rights in a particular area. They typically include at least five hunting grounds, covering an area of 1,000 hectares or more, and have regulations designed to keep the wildlife populations in balance. Every five years, the Flemish government publishes a calendar that shows when each species can be hunted; the current one expires in 2018. Each hunting season lasts

for about three months, though exceptions are made if a wildlife population increases in size, as in the case of the wild boar. Because of its extremely wide distribution, the animal may be hunted yearround. Only the land owners can grant hunting rights. “They decide whether or not you can hunt in their area, or they can allow someone else to decide for them,” says Vanwanseele. Every land owner must also submit an annual plan to ANB, which then specifies how many animals can be hunted based on the overall size of the population. Hunters’ activities, in turn, are supervised by ANB. “To hunt in Flanders, you must first prove that you have sufficient knowledge and expertise,” says Vanwan-

seele. “All prospective hunters must pass a theoretical exam and a practical test.” Butchers obtain game from one of three examination centres in Belgium. “A veterinarian checks the meat to determine its origin,” explains Ellen Van Borre of the Antwerp butchery De Roephal Van de Poel. “They also take samples from the meat to ensure it hasn’t been mislabelled and is fit for consumption.” Wildlife can be transported and traded as soon as the hunting season begins, and for up to 10 days after it ends. The hunting season for hare, for example, runs until 31 December, but the meat can be sold until 10 January. The only exception are frozen deer, captive-bred wild animals and wildlife obtained legally from

outside Flanders. When hunting season ends, you can still obtain good quality wild meat from reputable butchers like Van de Poel. “There are places in New Zealand and Russia where animals such as deer, boar and pigeons are farmed,” says Van Borre. “We can usually get it throughout the year.” Wild dishes pop up in restaurants this time of year, too, with stoofpotje made from deer or boar a regional favourite. Some restaurants are well known for their wild menus, including Carte Blanche in Ghent and Augustina in Hasselt. Antwerp has several options, including The Glorious Inn, De Manie and Minerva. Supermarkets Delhaize and Albert Heijn also sell their own lines of game.

BITE Caterer delivers freshly cooked lobster straight to your door

lobsterpot.be

Many of us dream of turning our hobbies into a full-time job. Peter Van der Smissen made this a reality when he retired after 33 years in the banking industry to focus on his true passion: lobster. Rather than opening a restaurant in a fixed location, however, Van der Smissen decided to take Lobsterpot on the road, cooking for private functions across Flanders. “I am passionate about lobster and wanted to make it accessible to people who would never cook it themselves,” he says. Van der Smissen’s passion becomes abundantly clear as soon as you enter his kitchen. The homemade stock of vegetables and herbs is cooking on the stove, filling the house with mouth-watering aromas. “The secret to tasty lobster is to cook it as fresh as possible,” he says. “Otherwise the meat becomes rubbery and dry. By cooking the fresh lobster in bouillon, we ensure it is tasty, tender, and succulent.” He prepares the stock at home and transports it with live lobsters to the destination, where the lobsters are cooked to ensure they

arrive on the plate warm and full of flavour. Van der Smissen and his team can cater for up to 80 people and in almost any location. To date, Lobsterpot has served beach parties, wine tastings and private dinners. Each Lobsterpot event includes a starter of either homemade gravlax or oysters. That’s followed by the lobster, served with tomato, egg and salad and Van der Smissen’s signature mayonnaise or cocktail sauce. And for dessert, the chef has homemade apple tart with ice cream and custard. For quests who are allergic to shellfish, there are alternatives available. Lobsterpot can supply almost everything for an event, including forks, bibs and even wet wipes. “This makes it much easier for the host,” says Van der Smissen. “The only thing we don’t do is the wine. But we can recommend some very fine labels that complement the meal perfectly.” Over the festive season, Lobsterpot has a special take-away menu. You can order lobster and oysters by the piece, and salmon by the portion. “It’s ideal for a couple who might be at home over

Christmas and want something special,” says Van der Smissen. And if you live in the Antwerp area, Lobsterpot can also arrange for that dinner to be delivered to your door. But hurry, because it’s a limited-time offer. \ DS

december 14, 2016

You want it darker

week in arts & CULTURE

Artist Sammy Slabbinck on designing Leonard Cohen’s last album cover Tom Peeters More articles by Tom \ flanderstoday.eu

Bruges-based collage artist Sammy Slabbinck, famed for his retro-style and absurd juxtapositions, says designing the cover for Leonard Cohen’s last album has brought his career full circle.

ammy Slabbinck started making found-photo collages in 2009 using vintage copies of fashion and entertainment magazines. Juxtaposing the images, he confuses observers with absurd incongruities, forcing them to view the images from a wholly new perspective. With the clear influence of Magritte, a touch of Monty Python and a taste for retro design, Slabbinck’s collages offer an escape to a more whimsical world. More recently, spurred by his growing influence on social media, his art has appeared in stop-motion animated films. Then last spring, British band Coldplay’s “Up&Up” music video was released. “I started to receive congratulations from different people on social media,” Slabbinck says. The reactions were not surprising, since the video was clearly inspired by Slabbinck’s work.

INSTAGRAM.COM/SAMMYSLABBINCK

album, and we are looking for someone to design the cover’,” Slabbinck recalls him saying. “They asked if I’d be interested.” Obviously he was, and Slabbinck soon received a photo, taken with Adam’s iPhone, that depicted Leonard Cohen lounging with a cigarette outside his villa in Los Angeles. “They only sent that one image, with a request that I make a cover out of it.” Following Cohen’s death on 7 November, less than three weeks after the release of You Want It Darker, the design request gained a deeper meaning. “You know, when I saw his Belgian comeback show in Bruges, and later on, one of his performances on Sint-Pietersplein in Ghent, he was still a fit man in his 70s,” Slabbinck says. “But when I was designing the artwork, I received four video messages from Leonard, in which he told me more about the album. I could see that he’d got older. On the title track, he sings ‘I’m ready, my Lord,’ as if he’d made peace with himself.” Where did the idea for the album cover come from? “I made several designs, but it was the very first one that Adam and Leonard were most

enthusiastic about,” says Slabbinck. “You can see this white frame as a window to the world, or as a photo, in which the singer looks back on his life, with poetic nostalgia.” The contrast between black and white, Slabbinck adds, refers not only to the album’s title, but Cohen’s own life. In a lyric video the Flemish artist made later for the title track, he uses the image of the frame again. Working with the Cohens was not the first time that Slabbinck has designed a record sleeve, and it will not be the last. He’s already been approached by Adam to do the artwork for his latest album, due for release next spring. “I like doing this a lot,” he says. “In these iTunes- and Spotify-driven times, a video or an album cover can help construct and establish the identity of a band or an artist. I’m really happy that You Want It Darker is also released on vinyl.” Adding still images to music brings Slabbinck’s career full circle. “I started collecting vintage magazines from a very young age, but, initially, I didn’t do very much with them. When I began making CD compilations of my favourite tunes, I wanted them to have their own sleeves. So I started designing them, as if they would be sold in record stores.”

A recently uncovered painting by turn-of-the-20th-century surrealist James Ensor has been sold by Sotheby’s in Paris for €7.4 million, the most ever paid for a work by the Ostend artist. The work, titled “Skeleton Arresting Masked Figures”, was expected to bring in up to €1.5 million. The 1891 painting was owned by the Serruys family of Ostend, who had received it from the artist. It was still in excellent condition, which lent to its appeal on the market. There is a theory that Ensor meant for the central skeleton in the image to represent himself.

Kazerne Dossin wins Science Policy prize The Kazerne Dossin Memorial, Museum and Documentation Centre on Holocaust and Human Rights in Mechelen has won the Flemish Minister Prize for Science Policy. Kazerne Dossin, or Dossin Barracks, was Belgium’s processing centre during the Second World War for Jews, who were transported from the site to concentration camps in Germany and Poland. Already home to a research centre, the site opened a museum in 2012. The prize is an initiative of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and the Arts and is awarded every three years to a person or organisation that presents scientific information to the public in a way that is unique and accessible. Kazerne general director Christophe Busch said that the prize was “an enormous incentive to further spread our insights and work concerning cumulative radicalisation processes, then and now. Kazerne Dossin wants to continue to draw lessons from the conflicts of the past in dealing with contemporary social challenges.”

You can see the white frame as a window to the world in which the singer looks back on his life Of course, Slabbinck is not the only person in the world experimenting with this retro-collage style. But that image of a bowl of soup becoming a swimming pool can only have been inspired by him. “It’s all about ideas and taking things out of their context,” he says. “This Coldplay director just gathered a few of the best ideas around in a music video. When I contacted him, he admitted it was his interpretation of my idea. I told him copying is not the same as creating.” Learning from the experience, Slabbinck, 39, realised the power of social media – including Instagram and Tumblr, which serve as his online portfolio – in spreading his work around. In the art world, he says, you always have to be ahead of the rest. “A picture on a computer doesn’t take you anywhere; it’s all about the ideas.” A few months ago, he noticed a new follower on Instagram. Behind the alias Commandercohen was Adam Cohen, the son of the late music legend Leonard Cohen. Slabbinck promptly sent him a message, explaining that he is a big fan of both of them. Some days later came a friendly reply, followed by another message. “‘By the way, we are recording my father’s new

Ensor painting sells for €7.4 million

VTM to cancel Royalty Public broadcaster VTM is cancelling its Sunday evening series Royalty after 20 years. The weekly programme covered Belgium’s royal family, as well as royals in other countries, particularly the Netherlands and the UK. “The interest in the royal family is declining, particularly among young people,” chief editor Kris Hoflack said. He also mentioned that Belgium’s royal family is more private and hence less communicative with the press than other royal houses. The final episode of Royalty will air this month. Sammy Slabbink’s “Seafood”, “Above & Beyond” and the album cover for You Want It Darker

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What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever done in Flanders? If you can’t think of anything at all, you’d better check out our new e-book

Quirky Flanders offers 20 unexpected – or downright odd – activities or sights across the region you can get busy taking part in right now

Visit the Flanders Today website to download the e-book now! For free!

www.flanderstoday.eu

\ ARTS

december 14, 2016

O Mother, where art thou?

Brussels’ offbeat theatre company offers uneasy tale of love, loss and fragility Tom Peeters More articles by Tom \ flanderstoday.eu

PEEPINGTOM.BE

“W

e took a boat without exactly knowing what direction it would take us,” says Gabriela Carrizo. It’s all part of the organic creative process specific to Peeping Tom. Carrizo – the Argentinian choreographer you may know from Kid, a movie by Flemish director Fien Troch – co-founded the Brusselsbased dance and theatre company in 2000 with her partner, Franck Chartier, a former dancer for Maurice Béjart’s Ballet of the 20th Century. Their new English-language play, Moeder (Mother), the second of their Family trilogy, is a very typical performance for them – meaning it’s a very atypical performance by anyone else’s standards. Once again the duo have succeeded in evoking a weird, imaginative world out of a realistic setting, surprising audiences with their surreal mix of theatre, dance and music that can be horrifying, heart-breaking or hilarious in equal parts. “We keep changing things,” Carrizo explains, the day after the first round of performances in Brussels’ KVS theatre. Sitting in the audience, she can take that little distance from being the director that she needs to see things from another angle. “It’s about seconds,” she says. “In the cinema you can cut, on stage you can’t, and timing is crucial for such a fragile play as Moeder.”

From her place in the audience, she was surprised to hear people laughing. “We didn’t see that coming,” she admits. “It was really meant to be a drama,” Chartier agrees. They always end up somewhere between laughter and tears, and the laughter often appears to cover the audience’s unease. In this case, it happened during the death of the eponymous mother. On stage, it is symbolised by a funeral service, but it’s made tangible by the hurt a

mother feels when she is forbidden to touch her own child, who has to grow up in an incubator. “That’s the real tragedy of the play: Mother and child can never be one again,” Carrizo says. “In real life, the opposite exists, too. Sometimes an overprotective mother cannot let go.” Despite a chaotic atmosphere, everything in Moeder is skilfully connected. “Take this incubator,” says Carrizo. “It’s also a way to show things, like a display, so it’s

a perfect fit for the setting of the play: a museum.” By making the stage a museum, the director adds another layer to the audience’s viewing experience. On top of that, nothing in the family-run museum is what you would expect it to be: Sculptures can be real, and frames are not only there to keep the paintings in place. “Museums raise questions about what people want to record or keep, and what will remain of their lives,” says Carrizo.

It’s a clear nod to the concept of memory, something that was tackled in Vader (Father, 2014), the first part of the trilogy directed by Chartier, which was set in a retirement home. He says it was important this time for his partner to be in charge, since she understands how it feels to lose a mother, as well as to be one herself. “The biggest challenge for the third part of the trilogy, Kinderen (Children), will be to show what children and teenagers feel not from an adult perspective, but to stick as close as possible to the emotional world of the child.” Uma, the couple’s daughter (who starred in their 2004 play Le Salon) will be 15 when they launch Kinderen in 2018. “Peeping Tom has always tackled big issues in life, such as birth, love, loss and death,” says Chartier, “but we take small, familiar interactions between people as a starting point.” In fact, he continues, “we see our performances as installations, in which we try to fully include the audience. The ultimate goal is to be in the same story. For that, we always create a parallel mental world alongside a realistic stage set. By zooming into the heads of our players and dancers, we show what’s inside, mixing the real with the unreal and the surreal.” Moeder (in English) runs in Antwerp and Genk this month and in Bruges next April

Picasso in 3D: Little-seen sculptures and influential objects at Bozar An exhibition in Brussels sets out to convince us that the greatest painter of the 20th century was also a great sculptor. It doesn’t quite succeed, but it is full of pleasures for Picasso aficionados, along with insights into the way he worked and the objects that inspired him. Picasso was trained in drawing and painting, and was clearly talented from a very young age. His work in three dimensions, on the other hand, was unschooled and seems more tentative. Early on he worked in the shadow of other sculptors, and in his own shadow as a painter, and throughout his career he needed technical help to realise his ideas. The Bozar show has 80 pieces of sculpture, from 1902 up to the 1960s, accompanied by about 20 paintings, 15 ceramic items, and various non-European art objects from Picasso’s personal collection. Most come from the Picasso Museum in Paris and FABA, the foundation set up by Picasso’s grandson, and rarely travel.

The earliest sculptures come from come, when Picasso began to the turn of the century, when collect masks and statues from Picasso was in his 20s. Modelled Africa and the Pacific. in clay, these apply the The inclusion of these objects technique of masters is one of the exhibition’s such as Rodin to great strengths. These are themes familnot generic examples of iar from Picasso’s non-European art that may painting, such as or may not have inspired “The Jester” (1905). Picasso, but objects he Next come held dear and saw every wooden day. sculpKnowing tures from this adds a period force to spent in the suggesthe Pyrenees tion that a and Paris, Grebo mask which show from Ivory the influence Coast may hold of Catalan the key to the folk art and deconstructed painted musical religious instrument statues. in “Violin” The primi(1915), or the tivism emerging meaningful in these works juxtaposition © Succession Picasso/SABAM Belgium 2016. Photo: RMNgets stronger of “Woman’s Grand Palais (Musée Picasso de Paris)/Béatrice Hatala in the years to Head” (1931Picasso’s “Violin”, from 1915

32) and a large Nimba mask from Guinea. The dialogue between Picasso’s painting and sculpture is also interesting, though somewhat one-sided. Cubism, which Picasso developed with Georges Braque, was a revolutionary way of treating three-dimensional space in painting, and yet he is not particularly innovative when it comes to translating these ideas back to three dimensions. The highlight here is meant to be the small bronze “Absinth Glass” (1914), which plays with form and volume, and includes a real silver spoon in the same way that the Cubist paintings incorporated scraps of newsprint and wallpaper. And, in an affront to convention, the bronze is painted. Yet this hardly has the same power as Alexander Archipenko’s Cubist “Woman Walking” (1912) or Boxers (1914), both a few rooms

Until 5 March

BOZAR.BE

away in Bozar’s show The Power of the Avant Garde. Failure is also interesting, of course, particularly in a genius like Picasso. One of the most intriguing rooms in the exhibition shows him failing, in the 1920s, to produce a monument for the grave of his friend, the poet Guillaume Apollinaire. A series of vaguely erotic biomorphic sculptures entitled “Metamorphoses” was rejected, as was an open lattice work of welded iron that suggests the connected stars in a constellation. So was “Woman in the Garden”, a large figure made of scrap metal. This is not to dismiss Picasso’s assemblages altogether. “Bull’s Head” (1942) is just a set of handlebars welded to a bicycle seat, yet it has a strange totemic power. “Head” (1958) is simple and silly, a face conjured from a wooden box and a pair of buttons. \ Ian Mundell

Bozar

Ravensteinstraat 23, Brussels

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\ ARTS

Tango 2.0

It’s tango, but not as we know it from Antwerp’s happy outsiders Christophe Verbiest More articles by Christophe \ flanderstoday.eu

ELJUNTACADAVERES.COM

Argentine musician Enrique Noviello leads an Antwerp septet happy to be defying musical purists with their blend of tango and hip-hop – without a digital download in sight.

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hen I was living in Argentina, my ambition was to become a good saxophone player,” Enrique “Kiki” Noviello says. “I stumbled upon the bandoneon by accident, after I had moved to Europe.” It happened at a point in his life, he says, when he wanted to make a career switch. “I’d had it with being a session player, always moving from one band to the other and touring endlessly. Not only did I have kids, I also wanted to tell my own story.” It’s been a bumpy ride for Noviello, who was born in Argentina in 1974 but now lives in Antwerp. He left his homeland in 2001. “I decided to go to Amsterdam, where a friend was living, and from there explore Europe. I burnt all my bridges and sold everything I had. Sadly, the heavy economic crisis of that time in Argentina devalued my money. I should have had enough to live on for a year, but it was reduced to €500 and a plane ticket.” After his visa expired, he lived below the authorities’ radar, first in the Netherlands and then in Flanders. “In Amsterdam I met Ambrassband, a punk brass band from Antwerp. Eventually I moved into their squat, and I’ve been in Antwerp for the past 15 years.” In 2007, he became a Belgian citizen. Switching to the bandoneon also meant embracing the tango, the music of his home country. As it happened, he had to travel more than 11,000 kilometres to discover its power and beauty. “Distance always helps,” he says. “It helped me to question certainties I had about myself and my country. And tango is music you can only understand after certain things have happened in your life: loving and losing, dreaming and failing, accepting you’ll never be able to realise those dreams. In one word: You need maturity to understand tango.” Noviello leads El Juntacadaveres, a septet named after a novel by 20th-century Uruguayan author Juan Carlos Onetti. “One day, I bought the only Spanish-language novel in a secondhand bookshop in Antwerp, Juntacadáveres (Body Snatcher) by Onetti,” he recalls. “The book had such an effect on me that I started composing music. I think you can find a lot of Onetti in both the general mood and the lyrics of our music.” According to Jean-Paul Sartre, Noviello explains, Onetti was the real inventor of existentialism, but, without ever breaking through to a wide audience, he remained a writer’s writer. “The poetry of his writing is unique: both simple and profound.” Discovering Onetti coincided with Noviello buying his first bandoneon: “I had the feeling that every piece of the puzzle had fallen together. When I started composing the music for El Juntacadaveres, I was all alone with a computer and the bandoneon. I was strongly influenced by the [Paris-based] Gotan Project, who had a very interesting approach to tango music.” Then he started building the band. At first they were still what he calls a classical tango orchestra, with flute, double bass,

Vinyl and cassette: Enrique Noviello (third from right) and El Juntacadaveres march a different tune in more ways than one

violin, two bandoneons and acoustic piano. Then they incorporated drums and electric guitars. “The latest addition was the rapping, and that has been our formation for the last five years.” They are happy outsiders in today’s music world, he says. “The tango people don’t consider what we do to be tango, the rock people don’t consider it rock, the mainstream doesn’t see us as mainstream.” Following up their debut album, De Platino, in 2013, they have now released Who’s Gonna Stop Us, the first volume of a trilogy. “It’s a tribute to our main influences. Who’s Gonna Stop Us, a yellow vinyl, refers to the Bronx in the 1970s, the place and time where hip-hop was born. It was a rebellion against the mainstream music of the time.” The second EP will be red. “It’s a flashback to Buenos Aires, again in the 1970s, when Astor Piazzolla founded his octeto, which was the first time a tango ensemble had used electric guitar, drums and Hammond organ.” The same period will be centre stage on the third release: a black vinyl dedicated to the Antwerp music scene. “I’ll be looking for the kleinkunst form of singing that reigned here. When you put the three EPs together, you get not only the Belgian flag, but also the complete identity of our music.” The EPs will be released on vinyl and cassette. “It’s a way of not doing what the mainstream tells us to do,” says Noviello. “A cassette clearly sounds better than a digital file because

More new music this month Daan

Zimmerman

Nada • [PIAS] “I broke the wrong heart: It should have been mine”, Daan confesses on his new album. This soul-baring collection of songs about loss and pain convinces most strongly when the Flemish musician keeps it simple, musically. Those moments recall the later work of Johnny Cash. In other songs, electronic elements are inventively integrated so they don’t clash with the more intimate moments. With the exception of the Spanish electro-pop that concludes the album, that is. It’s the only track that’s really nada.

The Afterglow • Zimmerman One of Flanders’ most successful rock bands of the decade, Balthazar, decided to take a break to give members the chance to pursue solo projects. A few months after Maarten Devoldere’s debut as Warhaus comes Zimmerman, the alter ego of bass player Simon Cassier. On The Afterglow, he deals in compact rock songs with drawling vocals. It’s a bit surprising he took Bob Dylan’s birth name as his moniker, but as the Nobel laureate once said himself: “You call yourself what you want to call yourself.”

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\ zimmermantheband.com

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you have a physical action. Secondly, it’s a nice object, one that’s linked to mobility and progress. Back in the day, having a Walkman was the shit.” The music industry has radically changed, he points out, with the model of communication between artist and receiver corrupted. “After an intense creative process – from writing the songs to designing the artwork – you realise that your CD has no value. No commercial, spiritual or artistic value, because you just become an element in a playlist on iTunes, Spotify or another digital platform. The music is sold for a few cents per track, and the number of new releases each day is infinite.” It’s a game he can’t win: “I will never have the means to be competitive in that market.” Noviello is very radical in his choices, and, unlike with most vinyl releases, you won’t get a download code. “If I die tomorrow, I’ll leave something nice behind. Something more than a file stored at a digital centre in the middle of nowhere. That’s why I’ll do it my way. I have the feeling I don’t have to please anyone or anything except my own creative hunger.” El Juntacadaveres play Brussels in January and Zemst in March. The new album can be found at vinyl shops, including Tune Up in Antwerp, Doctor Vinyl in Brussels and Music Mania in Ghent

\ AGENDA

december 14, 2016

Riding the rails

CLASSICAL

Kuifje in Train World Until 16 April

Train World, Brussels trainworld.be

intin, the fictional globetrotting boy reporter beloved by millions, is currently the guest of honour at Train World, the railway museum in Schaarbeek that opened last year. In the museum’s first temporary exhibition, the role that trains played in many Tintin comic strip albums is explored through original artwork and archival materials. Hergé, the Belgian cartoonist who created Tintin (known as Kuifje in Dutch), loved the machinery of the modern age and sent his hero on adventures all over the world via various modes of transport. In his first adventure, published in 1929, Tintin travels by train from Brussels

Antwerp

North Station to Moscow. Hergé was the pen name of Georges Remi, who died in 1983. “Trains are featured in at least 10 of the 24 Tintin albums,” Train World director Pieter Jonckers told Het Laatste Nieuws. “Hergé used the train not just as a setting but also as a character. Many crucial scenes take place in a train station or train carriage,

and often chase scenes, too.” One room in the exhibition is dedicated to original drawings by Hergé from Tintin’s adventures and other stories. The main hall of the museum, where the permanent collection of train engines and cars is displayed, has also been augmented with artwork and original documents from the artist’s archives.

Some of the works are on loan from the Hergé Museum in Louvain-laNeuve, while others are taken from Train World’s permanent collection. The museum houses the collections of the Belgian National Rail Service, including 22 locomotives and hundreds of other objects related to the railway. The museum is located both in the historic Schaarbeek train station and a newly constructed warehouse. In honour of the exhibition, a working train on the AntwerpSchaarbeek-Brussels-Nijvel line has been decorated with Tintin artwork. The museum hopes to attract 50,000 visitors during the exhibition’s run. \ Diana Goodwin

VISUAL ARTS

Russian National Orchestra

Dorothy Iannone: Lineage of Love

Elisabeth Center, Antwerp elisabethcenter.be

The Russian National Orchestra, founded during the Glasnost years by conductor Mikhail Pletnev, have spent nearly three decades touring the world as a cultural ambassador. Antwerp’s newly renovated Elisabeth Centeer hosts the ensemble for a night of music written by Russia’s best-loved composers. The RNO’s special guest for the occasion is star pianist Nikolai Lugansky (pictured), recognised as one of Russia’s foremost interpreters of Rachmaninov. It’s a good thing, too, as Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No 3 in D minor is on the programme, alongside Shostakovich’s Festive Overture and Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake.

Until 29 January

Kiosk, Ghent kioskgallery.be

American-born, Berlin-based visual artist Dorothy Iannone has been creating controversial, sexually liberated works for over half a century, but it wasn’t until the turn of the millennium that she began to get her due. This, her first solo exhibition in Belgium, follows several high-profile gallery shows across Europe. Lineage of Love surveys the octogenarian’s entire career, from her early abstract period to her classic series of mythic, folk-inspired mosaics and into the 21st century. The influence of Byzantine and Buddhist iconography as well as Japanese print-making technique is prominent. \ GV

Brussels Stijn Meuris – Tirade: Spoken-word performance by the veteran Flemish singer takes a look back at 2016. Don’t expect a best-of; Meuris delivers more barbs than bravos (hence the title). 22 December 20.00, Ancienne Belgique, Anspachlaan 100

Ghent Badke: Belgian-Palestinian dance production celebrates cultural resilience. Ten young Palestinian dancers join forces with Belgian choreographers to fuse traditional dance moves with contemporary styles. 16-17 December 20.00, Vooruit, Sint-Pietersnieuwstraat 23

VISUAL ARTS Bruges Nativities: A selection of local collector Henri Vansweevelt’s 800 nativity scenes. Acquired over the decades, Vansweevelt’s impressive collection spans three centuries of craftsmanship from more than 80 countries. Until 6 January, Volkskundemuseum, Balstraat 43 \ visitbruges.be

FILM

FESTIVAL

LITERATURE

Wintering!

Short Notice

Dendermonde’s Wintering! festival is a celebration of that coldest and darkest of seasons, whose cold and dark are nevertheless a fine excuse for community warmth and imagination. For one magical evening, the entire city centre comes alive with open-air light installations, circus performances, concerts and

PERFORMANCE

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\ Georgio Valentino

17-18 December, 18.00

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\ abconcerts.be

CLASSICAL 16 December, 20.00

Oltremontano and Gesualdo Consort Amsterdam: The Dutch Renaissance music ensemble perform the Christmas hits of yesteryear, specifically 1585. Featured works include polychoral symphonies composed by 16th-century Venetian organist Giovanni Gabrieli. 16 December 21.00, Amuz, Kammenstraat 81

Dendermonde ccbelgica.be

plenty of piping hot food and drink. The festival hub is CC Belgica, and its centrepiece is the flaming interactive performance Incontri on Grote Markt, but there are over a dozen more participating venues. Among them is Van Winckellaan, site of a continuous fire show by Peter Gusta. \ GV

16 December, 20.00 It’s no surprise that the genre of the short story is currently experiencing a renaissance. With attention spans stretched to the limit and most thoughts capped at 140 characters, readers appreciate a narrative that doesn’t beat around the bush. Even award-winning Russian novelist Mikhail Shishkin (pictured)

Brussels

Beursschouwburg, Brussels passaporta.be

is getting in the game with his first volume of short stories, Calligraphy Lesson. This star-studded evening features readings by Shishkin and four more masters of the genre: Flemish author Annelies Verbeke, Welsh writer Cynan Jones and Dutch storytellers Jamal Ouariachi and Joubert Pignon. \ GV

Daughters of Darkness: Somewhere between art film and B-movie, Flemish director Harry Kümel’s 1971 cult classic is set in an off-season Ostend and sees a young newlywed couple seduced into a lustful frenzy by sexy vampires. (In English with Dutch and French subtitles) 16 December 22.00, Cinema Nova, Arenbergstraat 3 \ cinema-nova.org

CONCERT Antwerp

get ti

ckets

now

Oscar and the Wolf: The Flemish pop/rock sensation presents his much-anticipated sophomore album at Belgium’s biggest venue. Extra date added after the first concert sold out in a heartbeat. 29 April, Sportpaleis, Schijnpoortweg 119 \ sportpaleis.be

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\ BACKPAGE

december 14, 2016

Talking Dutch How Samson sex can save your marriage Derek Blyth More articles by Derek \ flanderstoday.eu

t’s not a word to drop casually into a Google search box, yet samsonseks might soon be voted the Dutch word of the year, in the annual competition organised by dictionary publisher Van Dale. Launched in 2003, the competition is een vaste prik in de eindejaars overzichten – a fixed spot in the end-ofyear reviews, according to De Standaard. Among this year’s entries are topical terms like betonstop – a halt to construction in open spaces, and Pokémonterreur – disruption caused by people playing Pokémon Go on their phones. The shortlist also includes samsonseks, proposed by Radio 1 presenter Ingrid Renders in an episode of the morning show Hautekiet. Anyone with Dutch-speaking children will realise that this refers to the hugely popular Flemish children’s TV programme Samson en Gert, starring the lovable dog Samson and his equally lovable owner (pictured). But don’t get the wrong idea. Samsonseks betekent niet dat je seks wilt met Samson of zijn baasje – Samsonseks doesn’t mean you want to have sex with Samson or his owner, a website in the Netherlands explained. Samsonseks omschrijft het moment waarop je het als ouders het beste seks kunt hebben – Samsonseks refers to the moment when parents can enjoy the best sex: namelijk wanneer het kroost afge© VRT

WOORDVANHETJAAR.VANDALE.BE

leid wordt door de beeldbuis – namely when the kids are distracted by the television, Renders explained. But why should it be voted the word of 2016? Wel, dat is een woord dat relevant is in het leven van vele ouders – Well, it’s a word that plays an important role in the lives of many parents, Renders argues. Want wanneer kunnen ouders nog eens heerlijk van elkaar genieten – Since when can parents still spend some quality time together zonder gestoord te worden door hun kinderen – without being disturbed by their children? Seks hoort liefst spontaan te gebeuren – Sex is at its best when it’s spontaneous, Renders said. Maar als ouder blijkt dat soms moeilijker dan verwacht – But for parents that’s sometimes more difficult than expected. We kunnen vaak niet eens ongestoord naar de wc – We sometimes can’t even go to the bathroom on our own, laat staan dat we rustig kunnen vogelen met onze wederhelften – never mind get down to some peaceful lovemaking with our better halves. But there’s one moment in the day when the kids’ attention is likely to be taken up with something else. Gelukkig is er dan Samson op de televisie – Fortunately there’s always Samson on television die de kinderen even afleidt – to distract the children, zodat de ouders rustig kunnen... – so that the parents can have a peaceful moment for... samsonseksen! – Samson sex! Voor ouders is het een uitgelezen kans om te rampetampen – For parents it’s the perfect moment to head off to the bedroom.

PHOTO OF THE WEEK

VoiceS of flanders today In response to TV weather forecaster wins prize for clear language Valerie Ziegelmeyer: so true! I used to watch her weather forecast when I lived in Antwerp and it helped me a lot to get into Dutch.

In response to Flemish mathematician receives ‘Silicon Valley Nobel Prize’ Roma Siugzdaite: Since mathematicians cannot get the Nobel Prize, this SV Nobel prize is a big thing

In response to 5 fun events in Flanders this week – Ghent Winter Festival Larry Erb: What an adventure!!

Kate O’Flaherty @KateOflaherty I’m off to Bruges tomorrow, hoorah. Getting my Christmas on.

Michiel Laflere @Mill3s Ghent in winter time is always a good idea! It’s a cosy town! #ghent #winter #fun

Nathalie Reusens @NReusens Leuven is ready 4 xmas!

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“I’m happy – emotional even – with this first place. But I’m also a big fan of Brel. I would never put myself on the same level as him, never mind on a higher level.”

“I can hardly believe interest in the royal house has diminished. Filip and Mathilde come out often enough. There’s enough to report about them.”

Wannes Cappelle, frontman of Het Zesde Metaal, whose song “Ploegsteert” came in at number one on Radio 1’s Top 100 Belgian songs of all time last weekend

Ingrid Vervaeck, a 56-year-old hairdresser from Wielsbeke, is taken aback by the end of the series Royalty on VTM (see story, p11)

If walls could talk “M had a relationship with a prisoner. She had regular contact with him. What sort of contact, we’ll leave to your imagination.” © Yves Herman/Reuters

LOCAL COLOUR A meeting room in Europa, the new home of the European Council in the Schuman area of Brussels, which is due to open early in 2017 and will host its first EU summit in March

An anonymous blog detailing the actions of guards, such as M, at Leuven Centraal prison has disappeared after prison management filed a complaint with the network provider

School run “The best way to get rid of stress? Sport. I run it off. If I go two weeks without running, I get moody and that brings stress.” Education minister Hilde Crevits has her own recipe for coping with the stress of the job

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