Twin brothers from a wealthy third century patrician family, they fled to the provinces to escape persecution for their Christian faith, eventually settling in Soissons (capital of the Belgic tribe of the Suessiones)—evangelising to the native population by day and funding their mission and aiding the poor by making shoes at night.
Cousin to Pepin the Short, Carolingian king of the Franks, and entrusted with responsibility over several offices of the royal court, the saint hailing from a town outside of Antwerp is venerated on this day, on the occasion of his peaceful death in 774 (*717).
Overlooking the question of geopolitics and focusing on the assertion of the European dominance, the graphic receives an update from conceptual artist Hank Willis Thomas for a new exhibit in Brussels that not only brings forward the timeline through the 1970s but also re-contextualises art history in terms of colonialism and social structures that informed and enabled their work with emphasis on Belgium’s own particularly cruel record. Click through to enlarge. Though some of the connections might seem tenuous at first, one begins to penetrate the linkages, like epoch of Art Deco following more aggressive excavating for copper, to take one example.
From the desk of NPR’s Photo Stories comes this review and curation of a recently published portfolio of four decades of the evocative photography of beachcombing Harry Gruyaert. His compositions frame seaside tableaux from his native Belgium, France, Ireland and dozens of other places and are collected in the new anthology Edges, referencing that liminal divide between shore and sea. Many more postcards from ocean-front holidays at the link above.
Born near Brabant and serving as a soldier of fortune before settling at a great abbey outside of the ancient city of Soissons as a hermit hoping to fade into retirement, Saint Arnold (*1040 – †1087)was elevated by the monastic community to abbot—an honour he only reluctantly accepted, persuaded to the return to take up office by an encounter with a wolf. Later, after assuring that his parish was in capable hands, Arnold returned to West Flanders and established an abbey of his own in the town of Oudenburg, there perfecting his skills in brewing beer—which, despite ignorance of the germ theory of pathology, he happily evangelised for and rightly touted as safer than water. Arnold, who is venerated on this day, composed a blessing thusly:
Benedic, Domine, creaturam istam cerevisiae, quam ex adipe frumenti producere dignatus es: ut sit remedium salutare humano generi: et praesta per invocationem nominis tui sancti, ut, quicumque ex ea biberint, sanitatem corporis, et animae tutelam percipiant. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.
Bless, O Lord, this creation beer, that you hvet been pleased to bring forth from the sweetness of the grain—that it might be a salutary remedy for the human race: and grant by the invocation of your holy name, that, whosoever drinks of it may obtain health of body and a sure safeguard for the soul. &c. Amen.
During one outbreak of the plague, an untold number of residents were able to avoid infection through sticking to hygienic beer—untold and unbeknownst as is the case with most effective public health interventions because there’s not the visible means of tracking success to compare with that of failure and efforts are hampered by the backfire effect. Arnold is the patron of hops-harvesters and brewers and his iconographic depictions include him holding a bishop’s mitre and a mash rake.
With a name nearly as awesome as our friend Ultragoth, today marks the veneration of Frisian abbot of the Benedictine order, credited with its revival in that part of the Netherlands on the occasion of his death or translation of his relics in 1183 or possibly 1198. Aside from the founding of three monasteries and being forewarned of an ambush by God and armouring himself with a cauldron, unfortunately not much else is known about the saint’s life or acts and more is known posthumously, vicariously about the fate of Hatebrand’s reliquary and relics in the centuries after his death through multiple civil and religious upheavals and who is presently scattered in various churches across Holland and Belgium
Having later significant influence on contemporaries like Edward Hopper, born this day in 1881 (†1946) Lรฉon Spilliaert, graphic artist and Symbolist painter, spent his formative years sketching the Belgian countryside. The autodidact was able to ply his talents as a career and was commissioned to illustrate anthologies of short-fiction in a Brussels journal that published writers in the same genre, which channelled the gothic components from Romanticism and Impressionism to form a distinct visual and poetic movement in France, Belgium and Russia. Before moving on to executing his own works with studies in landscapes, coastal scenes and brooding dreamscapes Spilliaert especially enjoyed illustrating the works of the representative writers of the movement, Paul Verlaine and Edgar Allan Poe.
Fรชted on this anniversary of her death in Sint-Truiden in 1224 (c. *1150), Christina the Astonishing (H. Christina de Wonderbare) was regarded as a saint in her own time, first for her reported resurrection, dramatically revived and levitating to the church rafters in front of the whole congregation gathered for her funeral after succumbing to a massive seizure and dying.
Later she recounted that she had visited Heaven, Hell and Purgatory and offered the choice to remain in Paradise or be restored to Earth for the sole purpose of delivering souls from the flames of the liminal place. Christina had floated up from the pews to the ceiling because she could no longer tolerate the stench of the sinful parishioners and embarked on a course of extreme penance and privation, conniving new tortures and punishments for herself—including extended wintertime swims in the frozen Meuse and to be carried downstream in the current and crushed by the millstone of a granary on the river. Despite all this behaviour, Christina never suffered injury from her misadventures, venerated in the Limburg region as the patroness of millers, those suffering from mental illness and mental health workers. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds’ recorded a piece about Christina the Astonishing in their 1992 dream song anthology which recounts her vita and hagiography.
Via Waxy, we are introduced to photographer Barbara Iweins through her project to help her come to terms with and couch in language and statistics accessible to us all of cataloguing the over ten thousand artefacts, items that she has acquired and held on to through nearly a dozen household moves and what their acquisition means. Even devoting fifteen hours a day to categorising and framing each object, the undertaking took nearly two-and-half years to complete. If you embarked on a similar project, how would you exhibit all your stuff—even that which is mostly hidden and tucked away unbidden?
but vaderbase? only you would be so bold: the Rebellion Republic names its military bases
cause cรฉlรจbre: documenting Russia’s historic gay cultural icons and personalities
false-flag: Trump crafts propaganda from stock photos, labelling random protesters as agents of Antifa
undisclosed location: a tour of the White House bunker, from nineteen-year-old documentary photos provided by the US National Archives
vote hillary: an artist’s prophetic 2016 appeal in the spirit of Andy Warhol’s “Vote McGovern” campaign screen-print
crimes against humanity: Belgium comes to terms with its genocidal colonial past with the help of toppling statues
karens’ personal racism valet: a bevvy of resources on defunding the police and reforming law enforcement
First printed on this day in Antwerp in 1570, the collaboration “Theatre of the Orb of the World” from Abraham Ortelius and Gillis Hooftman van Eyckelberg is considered the progenitor of the modern atlas and informed charting, seafaring and to a large extent the Golden Age of Exploration—transforming worldview from older, staid conceptions.
The edition of some seventy uniform, bound maps with keys, legends and explanatory text with a section called a nomenclator that was a registry of place names from Antiquity as well as table of endonyms and exonyms. Though more immediate literacy accrued with this publication and plate tectonics and continental drift would not be articulated or scientifically accepted until l centuries later, it is believed that Ortelius, while compiling his work, was one of the first people to notice the correspondence of the landmasses and postulate that they might be mobile.
Coming from noble stock in Flanders but orphaned as an adolescent then dispossessing himself of his inheritance and devoting his life to penance and pilgrimage—making the sojourn to Rome no less than ten times—and settling down to become a shepherd after a disfiguring disease confined him from the public, Saint Drogo of Sebourg (*1105 – †1186), who is venerated on this day, was reportedly given the power of bilocation and was seen—shrouded due to his hideous countenance—in attendance at Mass while, as witnesses attest, still tending his flock in the fields. Drogo’s patronage includes those whom others find repulsive, coffee house proprietors (that is someone to turn to at these times), midwives (presumably due to his great empathy and for the mother he never knew) and sheep. While it is unclear why coffee might be one of his attributes, it is not just a modern gimmick with documents from Mons showing that in the 1860s, the city’s guild of cafetiers were already claiming Drogo as their patron—and possibly is connected with his miraculous power of bilocation (a virtue of coffee) or his ascetic diet and insistence on only drinking hot water.
Courtesy of Nag on the Lake, we learn about a sensation caused when someone found a donate photo album at a thrift shop called Opnieuw & Company in the town of Mortsel outside of Antwerp chocked full of a mystery woman posing with all of Hollywood’s A-List celebrities.
The reaction was astonishment to see such a concentration of film elite spanning several years and prompted some exhaustive research, concluding that the adored individual was called Maria Snoeys-Lagler and member of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, a veteran organisation that reports on the entertainment industry, credentialed mostly from an outside perspective, funds film preservation and restoration and hosts the Golden Globes among other activities. Learn more and see Snoeys-Lagler’s extensive gallery of close portraits with the stars at the links above.
Since 1944, the governments in exile of the Kingdom of the Belgium and the Netherlands and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg had agreed to a customs union until superseded on this day in 1958 when the three nations ratified the Treaty of Brussels that integrated further the signatories both economically and politically.
This bolstering of cooperation and transparency ran parallel to the European Communities (all of whom were also founding members—the so called Inner Six along with West Germany, France and Italy) created by the Treaty of Paris of 1952 that established the pooling of industrial resources and would eventually serve as the model for the successor European Union. The tight group considered opening membership in 1960 to the Outer Seven—Austria, Denmark, Norway, Portugal (Spain still under dictatorship) Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom—the latter being particularly keen on joining as the Suez Crisis of 1956 (see previously here, here and here) with its intervention efforts undercut by the USA had shown Britain that it was no longer all-powerful and could not thrive without allies. Fearing that UK membership would become a Trojan Horse for American interests, France vetoed Britain joining for seven years until Georges Pompidou succeeded Charles de Gaulle as French president—with reassurances—accepted their application and began negotiations, the community finally expanding in 1972.
Reminiscent of another recent case of restoring the artist's original vision after an intervening conservator had “fixed” it for them, Saint Bavo’s Cathedral of Ghent has just unveiled the newly returned to its original state altarpiece (Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, Het Lam Gods) created by Jan and Hubert van Eyck in the 1420s. This masterpiece, one of the most stolen in art history and considered the first major work executed with oil paint is a polyptych consisting of twelve panels and foldable wings—and in the centre lower register portrays a lamb sent to sent to slaughter—ecce agnus dei qui tollit peccata mundi, “Behold the Lamb of God who bears away the sins of the world.”
The revealed eyes and nose, however, after much research and consternation, are distinctly not ovine but rather uncannily human. The old look was a bit toned down but the van Eyck brothers’ vision wasn’t exactly terribly off-putting or haunted either. Perhaps public reaction is compounded by the reception of the rotoscope adaptation of Cats in theatres over the holidays that made people lose their minds.
With one of the last remembrance ceremonies thought to include witnesses to history taking place and the siege of Bastogne begun on this day in 1944, Allied forces in the Ardennes cut off by the resurgence of the Nazi army in efforts to recapture the port of Antwerp relieved by General Patton’s Third Army seven days later, I recalled this artefact, souvenir that I found at a Flohmarkt earlier in the summer.
The troops were ambushed in this nexus of roadways in the region with Generalleutnant Heinrich Freiherr von Lรผttwitz requesting the surrender of the city—to which acting commander of the 101st Airborne Division Brigadier General Anthony McAuliffe replied succinctly “Nuts!”—holding the line until reinforcements arrived. The cast iron disc, which I didn’t know how to interpret at first and supposed still, is fitted with mounts, suggesting it was the plaque of a larger memorial and on the reverse is inscribed MADE IN COUVIN, a nearby municipality that was also the staging grounds for Adolf Hitler’s headquarters and bunker during the occupation of France.
Though some academic might take exception to this bit of folk etymology, the city of Antwerp is named after a legendary practise of hand-hurling ([h]ant werpen) commemorated with a bronze figure of the Roman soldier who put an end to exorbitant tolls.
According to local lore, trade was hindered by a despotic giant called Druon Antigoon, whom exacted a high price for passage (like Three Billy Goats Gruff) and would cut off a hand of a vessel’s captain who failed to pay the fee for docking and unceremoniously toss it into the harbor. A Roman captain of the guard named Silvius Brabo slew the menace by decapitating him with his sword and for the sake of poetic justice also cut off his hand and hurled it as far as he could. The scene was executed in bronze as a fountain before the guild halls in the main market square in 1887 by sculptor Jef Lambeaux in part to celebrate the end of the revanchment policy of imposing high tariffs—though without dismemberment.
avoir un jour de courage: the immortals at l’Acadรฉmie Franรงaise suggest a replacement for the English phrase “coming out”
notorious rbg: a leopard print camouflage homage to the Supreme Court Justice
vennbahn: a scenic bike trail following a former train track crisscrosses the border between Belgium and Germany multiple times, via Super Punch
acqua alta: tragic images of Venice drowning
mechanisms of affection: artist Maria Antelman explores how the tools of technology reflect the user
i’ve been called ruby giuliani: a drag queen entertained spectators during opening public testimony for the impeachment hearings
In order to curb congestion along the capital’s crowded corridors, Brussels’ municipal authorities are encouraging the return of hitchhiking, albeit with the help of a digital intermediary, to match up drivers with spare seats—most ridership as in most of the developed world is a one occupant per vehicle).
At first it struck me as a gimmicky partnership, but the point of putting the scheme behind a mobile application is not to try to rival other ride-hailing and rider-sharing services but to instil a sense of trust, insofar as the person that one’s who is accepting the ride may be a stranger but is not unknown to the network, registration and vetting required and a digital fingerprint is left in case something untoward were to happen. There’s no payment involved for using the service, leaving any exchange up to the driver and passenger, if any, and the chief motivation is to reduce traffic. The app could also, I suppose, become a gauge of reputation for problem riders or problem drivers. What do you think? Would you sign on? Old, traditional solutions are often not the most sexy or exciting but still the most reliable.
