Inspired by writers

I love hearing authors speak about their works, listening to them explain where their inspiration came from, why they chose to approach the subject matter in the way they did and how many pages they discarded along the way. I don’t even need to have read any of the author’s works; what particularly fascinates me is their approach to the creative process and gaining an insight into what makes them tick.

During the last year, Booker Prize winners Ben Okri and A.S. Byatt, as well as Herta Mueller and Gao Xingjian, both winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature, have been among the authors I have heard in Brussels.

So what sticks in my mind? In the case of Mueller, it is the way that writing and research have allowed her to understand what she never understood as a child growing up in totalitarian Romania. It was only later in life that Mueller realised the significance of small details such as the way her mother had peeled a potato with as fine a skin as possible or had taken pleasure in eating; for a woman who had been deported to a work camp, it was important not to waste food and to show that she wasn’t starving.

Mueller said her mother never talked about her experience in the camp and would simply say “I don’t know” when asked questions about it; her daughter wasn’t sure if the memories had been suppressed or if words simply couldn’t express the experience. In her 2009 book Atemschaukel (Everything I Possess I Carry With Me), Mueller explores such memories through the experiences of her late friend Oskar Pastior, who was a similar age to her mother and endured five years in detention.

As for Byatt, what inspired me was her curiosity and her desire to unearth as much as she could about people, objects, events, whatever it may be. Her research for her most recent novel, The Children’s Book, included learning more about the lives of children’s books’ writers, accumulating “heaps of books” about pottery and ceramics, and pursuing her love of decorative arts museums such as the V&A in London.

It was also fascinating to hear her explain how she feels a “deep anxiety” about stealing real lives for literary purposes; what she finds herself doing instead is mixing up so many people that she creates a new person, a bit like a “jigsaw.” Nor does she like to make direct use of events that happen in real life. What she prefers is being alert to repeated patterns, the same thing happening at least twice, because at that moment she realises she has stumbled upon a phenomenon that can be worked into her writing.

If you want to keep an eye out for future authors speaking in Brussels, the best place to look is the Passa Porta website. As for the next author to pass through town, it’s Turkey’s Elif Shafak tomorrow, June 25. Details are on this link. To read an earlier blog entry about Amitav Ghosh, click here.

Vuil & Glass: powerful performance

One of the advantages of living in Brussels is how close it is to other European countries, or put more cynically by some, how easy it is to leave the country.

This week I took advantage of this oft-cited fact and, straight after work, drove with a couple of friends to Eindhoven in the Netherlands to see ‘Vuil & Glass,’ a dance performance choreographed to music by Philip Glass arranged for cello octet - a powerful combination that had me mesmerised from beginning to end. It was by far the best dance performance I’ve seen since Nederlands Dans Theater came to Brussels a couple of years ago.

The eight cellists that make up Cello Octet Amsterdam sat side by side high up on a scaffolding on the stage, the seven dancers (there are usually eight, but one was unfortunately injured) moved around the whole stage, including around and under the scaffolding. The modern music and dance complemented each other perfectly.

The first time ‘Vuil & Glas’ was performed a few years ago its venue was a waste disposal station (hence ‘vuil’ – waste – in the title). The revival has been adapted for the theatre, but as the dance company, Conny Janssen Danst, says itself on its website: “Complete with new dancers, new choreography, new costumes, and a new composition – but still with eight cellists, a pile of mattresses, and the hypnotizing, pulsating music of Philip Glass.”

In short, it was 75 minutes of pure joy listening to and watching the musicians and dancers, who performed solos and duets interwoven with composition and choreography for the full ensemble. A double thumbs up from me.

Chopin and birthdays

I often tire of hearing that it’s one hundred, or however many hundred, years since the birth or death of this or that composer. Inevitably, these anniversaries serve as excuses for series after series of concerts or related events all focussed on that particular composer, which is all well and good, except that my reaction is often to get fed up with all the publicity before I’ve actually made it to a single performance.

This year is the 200^th anniversary of the birth of Chopin and needless to say I haven’t actually been to a concert of Chopin music this year although there have been plenty to choose from in Brussels.  

I simply find myself bombarded with choice and it all sounds so “samey” on paper. Instead I find myself being drawn toward the concert that’s on the bottom of a small leaflet or a footnote in a magazine, relishing the exciting new discovery. Fine, but there’s no reason why a well-publicised concert of a well-known composer who just happens to be having a posthumous birthday celebrated can’t be equally exciting.

And maybe after this weekend I’ll give the anniversary concerts more time of day. Why? Well, a stroke of luck really. Oblivious to my feelings about such anniversaries, a friend chose to take me to the small exhibition on Chopin that is currently showing at the British Library. And I loved it.

Headsets allowed me to listen to historic recordings of Chopin performances from the British Library Sound Archive and display cabinets were filled with original Chopin manuscripts, letters and even his death mask. The walls were full of information about Chopin’s life, from his early days in Poland to exile in France and his stay in Britain.

What did I learn? Well, Chopin didn’t like to perform in front of an audience, and gave only 30 concerts during his lifetime, he had tiny hands (as seen from a plaster cast of his left hand) and he apparently had an affair with the novelist George Sand that ended most dramatically (though we’re not told how) - and of course that I shouldn’t be as dismissive of events related to a composer’s anniversary.

Hidden gems: little-known art museums around Belgium

A word of explanation is probably in order as to why my blog has been so quiet for the last few weeks. The main reason is that I’ve been busy writing about the arts for magazines and newspapers, including a weekly column in Brussels Unlimited, and as a result have had little time left to update this blog.

So I thought I’d share with you a series of articles that I’ve written this month on little-known museums around Belgium.

·      The Gust De Smet museum, Deurle (Sint-Martens-Latem)

The spotlight is thrown on the Flemish Expressionist Gust De Smet, the golden years of the Sint-Martens-Latem art colony and the museum dedicated to his life and work.

http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/inner-circle

·      The Autrique House, Brussels

The story of the adventure undertaken by an artist and a write to restore this Victor Horta house and open it to the public.

http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/rebuilding-horta

·      The Roger Raveel museum, Machelen- aan-de Leie

A trip to the museum that was specially built for Roger Raveel, who - now aged 88 - is arguably one of the most important Belgian artists since World War II.

http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/never-ending-illusions

·      Geo De Vlamynck’s artist studio, Brussels

A peek into the studio of the late Geo De Vlamynck, a champion of the decorative arts, who not only painted but also made frescoes, mosaics and stained glass.

http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/traces-life

Collegium Vocale Gent and Saint Barbara

©Michel Garnier

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”

This quotation by the British novelist Aldous Huxley was placed on the first page of the programme accompanying a concert of Renaissance vocal music that I heard this week. More apt words would be hard to find.

It was the first time I had heard Philippe Herreweghe’s Collegium Vocale Gent, not least because whenever I’ve tried in the past to hear the ensemble they have either been touring or their concerts sold out. This week’s setting was the Eglise des Minimes in Brussels, the theme ‘Musica per Santa Barbara,’ the music a sheer joy to listen to.

Saint Barbara was the patron saint of Mantua, and in the 16^th century the Italian city’s duke had a basilica built in her honour. The Basilica di Santa Barbara attracted many composers including the Italian Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and the Fleming Giaches de Wert. It was their compositions along with those of Claudio Monteverdi (a pupil of Wert) that made up the evening’s one-hour programme of 16^th and 17^th century motets and mass excerpts.

The voices of the 14 unaccompanied singers, directed by Herreweghe himself, filled the church, no matter whether it was a quiet, mournful sound to accompany words of sorrow and misery or a rich, powerful tone as the joys of life were celebrated. The singing was pure, precise and simply beautiful.

My favourite piece was probably Wert’s motet “Vox in Rama audita est” (A voice was heard in Ramah), which opened with a wonderful bass voice that made my stomach feel tight such was the intensity, the tension building up further as the tenors, altos and sopranos joined in one by one. At times, the notes were so close together that the pain and anguish being sung about were almost palpable.

This was music that did indeed come very close to expressing the inexpressible.

The same programme will be sung in their Belgium home town of Ghent on Feb. 11 and then in Rouen, France on Feb. 12. A full calendar is available here.

Chinese culture: all fired up

  ©Palace Museum

I don’t know why I waited until the last possible week to see the exhibition 'Son of Heaven,' part of the Europalia China extravaganza that has been happening in Brussels during the last few months, but I did. Then again, I did go and see it twice that week!

My delayed visit may have had something to do with the fact that there were so many cultural offerings during the Europalia China festival that there was almost too much choice. And of course that time-old trap of saying to myself: ‘Oh it’s on for months, I’ll have plenty of time to see it’.

An added impetus to see it in January though was that I had just come back from a two-week orchestral tour to China, my first trip to the country, and was all fired up about everything to do with Chinese culture.

“Son of Heaven,” whose title refers to China’s rulers, didn’t disappoint. The exhibits included portraits of emperors on silk wall hangings, bronze ritual vessels, a jade shroud, and silk dragon robes once worn by the rulers. There were even a couple of terracotta warriors – admittedly not quite as impressive as the (almost) complete terracotta army I had seen in their Chinese home of Xi’an just a few weeks earlier, but you could view the ones in Brussels much closer up and could more easily see traces of their original colours.

The Brussels exhibition covered 5,000 years of Chinese culture and so was just a taster of the country’s imperial wealth during that time. Nonetheless the exhibits, many of which were on display for the first time outside of China, were simply exquisite. I couldn’t resist going back a second time, and if I hadn’t left it so late I may well have gone back again.

Cultural ideas for Belgium in December

In case you want a cultural escape from the Christmas shopping, I thought I’d share a few ideas of exhibitions, music theatre and dance happening in Belgium at the moment and about which I’ve recently written articles.

Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker has put together this year’s December Dance festival in Bruges. There’s at least one contemporary dance performance showing each day, and the programme includes choreography by William Forsythe, Trisha Brown and Jérôme Bel. (December Dance - Bruges - Until Dec. 13).

Interview with De Keersmaeker on the Bruges festival: http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/twelve-days-dance

The photography exhibition Controverses is, as its name suggests, all about controversial images. The headline-grabbing one is that of a naked, 10 year-old Brooke Shields – yes, the one that was removed from the Tate Modern in London after a visit by the Metropolitan police’s obscenity squad. Most of the photos on display caused an outcry of one sort or another, a few changed history. (Controverses – Botanique, Brussels – Extended until Jan. 3).

More about Brooke Shields, the Kissing Nun and other photos: http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/scandals-and-other-policymakers

The latest creation by the Antwerp-based company Muziektheater Transparant is A New Requiem. Taking Mozart’s Requiem as its inspiration, the work includes a contemporary literary, musical and artistic response to the old music. The work is a classic example of the company’s music theatre, which as its name suggests combines words and music. Tip: make sure your Dutch is up to scratch or else you might find it difficult to follow the spoken text, though you can still enjoy the song and music. (A New Requiem – Across Belgium and the Netherlands - Until April 5, 2010).

Interview with Muziektheater Transparant director Guy Coolen: http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/song-mad-director

I have to admit that I hadn’t heard of the Hungarian artist Lajos Vajda before I researched this article, but it turns out I’m not the only one as the Antwerp exhibition is the first-ever retrospective of his work in western Europe. Most of his works – paintings, drawings, collages, photomontages - are from the 1930s and influences of Paul Klee, Marc Chagall and Max Ernst can all be found. (In the Footsteps of Bartok: Lajos Vajda and Hungarian Surrealism - KMSKA, Antwerp - until January 17.)

A taster of what the exhibition has to offer: http://www.flanderstoday.eu/content/ordering-chaos

(Copyright for pictures, from top to bottom: ©Herman Sorgeloos; ©Oliviero-Toscani; Drawn by Roger Raveel; ©Panther and Lily, 1930-33, PMMI Ferenczy Museum, Szentendre)