The privilege may be yours, but only with battle: Jan I Moretus and the Struggle for the Plantin Press (Antwerp, until 16 January, 2011)

Forget the snow, forget the glühwein at noisy Christmas markets. Museum Plantin-Moretus (MPM) at Antwerp awaits you for the final month of the exhibition Jan I Moretus and The Struggle for the Plantin Press (until January 16, 2011). According to museum director Iris Kockelbergh, the show, which marks the 400th anniversary of Moretus's death in 1610, so far has been quite succesful with the public.

The serene atmosphere in these historical premises, Christopher Plantin's former print shop, belies the quarrelsome content on display: a family of printers fighting over a will, a roster of competitors aspiring to obtain the Plantin-Moretus exclusive printing privileges.

The story that curator Dirk Imhof (Cambridge University - Munby Fellow) tells is that of a successor having to battle his way through, but who eventually, in the span of his own 20-year career, steers the family business with an able hand. And as with books, Museum Plantin-Moretus is able to illustrate some finer details of this story with its unique archive.

The first document to attract the visitor's eye is Plantin's will, drawn up in 1588. Not only stood Christopher Plantin (d. 1 July, 1589) at the helm of a large printing house that remained active from the mid 16th until the mid 19th century, he also had five daughters who all married future printers who in turn set up shop at Antwerp, Leiden and Paris. Jan I Moretus (pictured, courtesy of MPM) had been assisting his father-in-law at Antwerp.

Plantin's choice to bequeathe the printing business to his wife, and after her death, to Jan I Moretus, did not fall well with the other family members. Moretus first had to come to a financial settlement with the other daughters and sons-in-law, and a final agreement was not possible until after a few drafts, as seen on display.

The battle for printer privileges takes up most of the exhibition, and Dirk Imhof expanded on this theme during a short international symposium entitled The Letter of the Law: Regulation and Censorship of the Book Trade in Early Modern Europe, organized by MPM and Vlaamse Werkgroep Boekgeschiedenis on 20 December, 2010.

Together with the entire business, Jan I Moretus inherited every privilege that Plantin was ever granted by the authorities. A privilege secured a distribution and sales monopoly over each new title that a printer was able to produce.

As Imhof was able to see in the Plantin-Moretus archival material, Jan I Moretus's practices to secure privileges bordered the margins of legality. With one of the Antwerp authorities in this matter he was distantly related, and naturally, having the best of relations. Some civil servants even kept Moretus perfectly in the know about the 'schemes' of his colleagues to steal away some of his privileges.

In the Netherlands, the Plantin-Moretus house had long enjoyed an exclusive position in the very lucrative business of liturgical works and Bibles. As demand for these kinds of books remained very high, several printers in the Netherlands tried to get their share of the cake by petitioning for privileges or simply by printing unauthorized liturgical editions: often by copying Moretus in cheaper editions on lesser quality-paper.

As Imhof was also to show with examples, some of the problems with local or foreign editions were attributed to Jan I Moretus himself, who not always put much effort in securing a general privilege for new editions. Was this negligence? Overconfidence? Whenever foreign printers challenged Moretus with rival editions, he was forced to act and secure his business.

If you think family fended for family in this matter, think again. When Plantin's son-in-law Aegidius Beys in Paris sought to benefit from the same privileges as Jan I Moretus as coheir, he was shown the exact same cold shoulder as many non-family printers. Specifically Beys sought part of the business in liturgical works. Eventually the sons-in-law went to court before the Council of Brabant, and the matter was settled in favor of Moretus.

At the symposium on 20 December 2010, three other speakers presented cases. Angela Nuovo (University of Udine) showed that the privilege system in Venice in the 16th century developed from an anti-monopolistic system, one characterized by a fair chance for each printer to obtain privileges for a limited time for new works that they were able to produce, to a system that became more person-related that required printers to obtain favors from the papal authority at Rome. Rome in Italy was to become the second printing center largely due to the relocation of Venetian firms. Some Italian printers traded their privileges to third parties who gained access to the Italian market.

Natalia Maillard Alvarez (European University Institute, Florence) dwelled on Spanish booksellers' and printers' strategies versus the Inquisition in the 16th century that actually benefited the book trade. Often booksellers became familiares or collaborators of the Spanish Inquisition themselved, thus avoiding severe indictment for themselves and colleagues.

So far, as Maillard Alvarez points out, Spain still lacks a comprehensive study on book distribution, one that supersedes the cases of individual printer families. A very interesting study could be made of the connections between multi-lingual and often interconnected families such as Giunti, Portinari, Boyer and Bellerus and their commercial interests in both Spain and Portugal, the Americas and Europe.

And finally, Stijn Van Rossem (University of Antwerp) zoomed in on the Verdussen family of printers, active at Antwerp in the 17th century. As a printer family, it compares more or less to the Plantin-Moretus dynasty in success, in duration (a printing business of nearly 250 years), and definitely in rich extant archival material, which allows Van Rossem to show how these printers tried to negotiate the legal framework which made their business thrive.

Once in a Lifetime: Admiring the Anjou Bible at Leuven

This is a Going East (3): East of Brussels, at Leuven, is where on 16 September 2010 the exhibition Bijbel van Anjou, Napels 1340: Een koninklijk handschrift ontsluierd (Anjou Bible, Naples 1340: a royal manuscript unveiled) opens at Museum M, city of Leuven's recently overhauled municipal museum.

Some readers may know that one of the, if not the, savviest manager-slash-art historian resides in Leuven, more precisely at Illuminare, Study Centre of Medieval Art. Indeed, Jan van der Stock is the only person here to have ever pulled off a Named Chair in Arts & Humanities: the Rogier van der Weydenleerstoel - Paul & Dora Janssen. And one of few who does not mince words when it comes to defending this country's rich and precious heritage against ignorance.

If anything has to with Netherlandic Art, manuscripts and bindings in this city, or with princesses such as Mathilde and Maxima opening exhibitions, we can bet our head on it that Jan van der Stock is behind its marketing machinery.

Even if in the case of this precious manuscript, Illuminare does a home run - after years of careful restorating work, the Anjou Bible is ready to go back to its Leuven vault, but not before allowing the public to catch a glimpse and to gather more about how a Naples manuscript -Medieval manuscripts are wont to travel, as history always teaches- ended up here.

This restauration work is the credit of this exhibition's curator: Lieve Watteeuw, whose line of work merits a chair on its own. Lieve in recent years became a PhD with a thesis entitled De handdruk van Chronos - Zorgen voor het Middeleeuwse manuscript 1731-1937 (The handshake of Chronos: Care for the Medieval Manuscript 1731-1937), about restoration theory and practice pertaining to the Burgundy library - yet awaiting translation and publication in English.

We hope that princesses may hereby return many times to admire Low Countries' artefacts with their broods - incognito.

Venue:
Museum M.
L.Vanderkelenstraat 28
3000 Leuven
www.mleuven.be

The Anjou Bible runs until 5 December 2010.
Tue-Sunday 11 a.m. - 6 p.m.

Going East (2): 800 years of Crosier Art in Western Europe on show at Rheine (Germany)

A 3-hour drive away from Brussels lies the town of Rheine in Nordrhein-Westfalen: close to Holland and Belgium, and a bow's arrow from Niedersachsen. And adjacent to the German highway, but tucked away in greenery lies Kloster Bentlage, which the city of Rheine beautifully restored and which serves as municipal museum grounds.

This city museum now plays host to an exhibition highlighting 800 years of Crosier art in Western-Europe. Fittlingly, because in 1437 members of the order of the Holy Cross, Crosiers, settled in Rheine and built Kloster Bentlage. The order wasn't dissolved until 1803, when the monastery grounds came into the family Looz-Corswarem from Liège-Rhine territory.

The order of he Holy Cross was founded in the 13th century in Belgium in the city of Huy. From the river Meuse/Maas and other places in the Prince-Bishopric of Liège and the Rhineland, the order spread all over Europe, to places like Paris and London. St Agatha in Cuijk (Holland) for instance played an important role in the order's history in the 15th century.

Although the Crosier order of canons regular today is thriving on four continents, it must be very pleased to see that Rheine took the lead in an exhibition celebrating its origins and involving artefacts from at least three countries.

Our interest involves the many items on loan from places like Brussels, Liège, Denderleeuw and Cuijck for among others sculpture, manuscripts, and bindings, all handled and placed expertly by curators and conservators at Rheine.

The exhibition opened on 29 August 2010 with festivities and representation from the Crosier's Generalate. It remains on show until 27 February 2011.

Venue:
Museum Kloster Bentlage
Bentlager Weg 130
48432 Rheine
www.kloster-bentlage.de

Opening hours:
Wednesday-Sunday 10 a.m. - 6 p.m.

Going East (1): Bibliophily in Hasselt

Is the exhibition Liefde voor het boek. Een keuze bibliofiele boeken, kunstenaarsboeken & boekobjecten in Vlaanderen vanaf 1900 tot 2010 currently on display in the city of Hasselt, writing a new chapter in the history of Flemish bibliophily / bibliophily in Flanders?

Firstly, let's recall -from Pierre Wigny's introduction to La bibliothèque de l'honnête homme- what a bibliophile yearns for, in contrast to an ordinary reader: l'édition originale, le petit tirage, l'illustration rare, la reliure signée; il manie lui-même avec amour le volume que les amis peuvent seulement regarder sans y toucher.

In many respects, to limit an overview of bibliophily in Belgium to Flanders has.. well.. its limits. Flemish bibliophile owners may live in Brussels or Wallonia and for Walloon collectors vice versa. Several reforms of state have Brussels playing a role as third party. The books on display are hardly by Flemish authors/in Dutch only, which is the official language in Flanders and of the Flemish in Belgium, let alone made by strictly Flemish artisans.

But if one keeps these nuances -to which Belgians eternally seem condemned, in mind, this choice can also entirely be justified. A language is a language, a culture is a culture and two aren't always one. Each culture has its own history of coming into being and its own highlights in different times. Such is the case for the Dutch- and French- and even German-speaking communities in this country.

And to complicate matters more, whoever tackles bibliophily in Flanders, may want to peek over the northern borders into The Netherlands, and vice versa, as the Flemish share their language and some of their history and literary predilections with that country.

Whoever wants to document bibliophily pertaining specifically to Flanders, will have to hark back to 1980, to a seminal exhibition held at Brussels. It did not emanate from our Royal and National Library just yet, just as bibliophile societies in those days and before rarely operated in terms of binary oppositions such as Flemish/Walloon. Books were.. well, Belgian.

The 1980 exhibition, entitled Vlaamse bibliofiele uitgaven 1830-1980, was held courtesy of a private initiative: VEV-Komitee Brussel (present-day Voka, Flemish association of entrepreneurs). It took place only steps away from our National Library, but oh, what a landing - on Grote Markt/Grand Place 19 in Brussels.

Compilers of worthwhile data from 147 books from 25 collections back then were Hilda van Assche, Richard Baeyens and Elly Cockx-Indestege. Ludo Simons wrote the introduction about 150 years of bibliophile editions of Flemish authors.

Our Royal and National Library did follow suit with two similar exhibitions, in 1991 and in 2004. For Flemish production a follow-up since 1988, but for our National Library a covering of book production according to its mission: nationally.

The first exhibition at the National library was in 1991 with catalogue: Bibliofiele uitgaven in België 1985-1990. Tentoonstellingscatalogus - Editions bibliophiliques en Belgique 1985-1990. Catalogue d'exposition. Myriam Buyst and Jo Depuydt. Introduction by Elly Cockx-Indestege. Brussels, 1991 (ISBN 90-6637-053-X; 2-87093-056-9).

The follow-up exhibition at the National library from 1994 was documented in Belgische bibliofiele uitgevers - Éditeurs belges de bibliophilie 1991-2003. Brussels, 2004 (ISBN 2-87093-150-6).

And at the end of the 1990s let's not forget the role of DRUKsel, a small book fair held at the city of Ghent devoted to beautiful books, with a varying degree of artisan publishers and printers from this country and broad. In its approach it defied categorization - DRUKsel was not devoted to bibliophily only, certainly not to bibliophily in a narrow sense. Who knows, perhaps the fair's fraying margins also contributed to its demise some years later.

Curator of Liefde voor het boek is Ludo Raskin, a former arts director to the province of Limburg and the city of Hasselt. The occasion is the Virga Jesse Feast 2010, a procession with religious roots occurring every seven years in Hasselt. Raskin's aim is an ambitious one - to select highlights from one entire century, in this case the 20th.

The exhibition saiys to reserve room for the work of artists who are strongly linked to bibliophily: Henry van de Velde, Max Elskamp, Frans Masereel, Jozef Cantré, Henri Van Straten, Edgard Tytgat and Paul Van Ostayen. It also highlights artist books of Roger Raveel, Hugo Claus, Jan Vanriet, Paul Ibou, which came about courtesy of many Flemish private presses. The curator also chose to shed light on specifically regional output from Limburg.

Venue:
Cultuurcentrum Hasselt
Kunstlaan 5
B-3500 Hasselt
www.ccha.be

Opening hours:
Tue-Fri 10 a.m. - 5 p.m, Sat-Sun 1-5 p.m.
Special opening hours:
Sat 14 / Sun 15 / Thu 19 / Sun 22 / Tue 24 / Sat 28 August: 7-10 p.m.

Catalogues:
-A catalogue, “Liefde voor het boek” (22,5/22,5 cm, 120 p) illustrated, with books from 70 artists and an introduction by Ludo Raskin. Edition of 500 copies. Price: € 15.
-A bibliophile edition “De Laatste Weg – Via Crucis. Een kruisweg in beeld en woord” with sculpture by Vincent Van Den Meersch and poems selected by Piet Thomas. Edition of 50 numbered copies (29,7 x 42 cm, 76 p). Price: € 100.

Theodoricus Martinus Typographus (Erasmus House Museum, 23 October-6 December 2009)

One would think that by now scholars would have unearthed everything about the origin of printing. Not quite. For more than three centuries, Paul Needham wrote in The Invention and the Early Spread of European Printing As Represented in the Scheide Library (2007), antiquaries and scholars have been trying to identify and pin down the earliest survival of printing. An attempt Needham still defined as "not banal."

Two Belgian scholars have placed themselves in that tradition: Renaud Adam and Alexandre Vanautgaerden, with their recent study "Thierry Martens et la figure de l'imprimeur humaniste. (Une nouvelle biographie)," Brepols, 2009, ISBN 978-2-503-53112-0. Theodoricus Martinus or Dirk Martens is none other that Belgium's first printer: every child is taught at school that Martens printed the first book at Aalst (Alost).

When the Low Countries -Belgium and Holland- celebrated the 500th anniversary of printing in 1973 -with a catalogue from Belgium's Royal Library that became an instant classic- the prototypographi were, as was admitted, chosen by convention, and differently so along national borders, with Martens as first printer for Belgium. Streamlining festivities even more, both countries were letting printing begin in 1473.

As Adam & Vanautgaerden write, a partnership between Dirk Martens and the German Joannes van Westfalen comes closer to the truth of the first printed book at Alost. Already in 1474, Joannes van Westfalen would be a very succesful printer in the city of Leuven, and the first activity of Martens at Alost was short-lived. Whether both men actually did meet in Venice, as their first printing material seems to betray, and who was actually printing at Alost, are just two of many questions laden with mystery.

Still, the new census by Adam & Vanautgaerden of 269 editions attributed to Dirk Martens also reveals that there is a good reason to shed light anew on our first printer: more so than Joannes van Westfalen, Martens was successful at experimenting with and introducing new language and character sets, and therefore deserves to be celebrated as first typographer.

The exhibition "Theodoricus Martinus Typographus" looks at Martens as graphic designer. It also puts ancient and contemporary typography in juxtaposition. The exhibition is in the hands of a graphic design studio from Brussels, Sign, which has signed every card or web page of the Erasmus House Museum in the last 15 years.

Details: Theodoricus Martinus Typographus. Exhibition. Erasmus House Museum, Anderlecht (Brussels). 23 October - 6 December, 2009.

Le bon plaisir: catalogue details, current exhibition at Bibliotheca Wittockiana (Brussels, until 28 February 2009)

Here is bibliographical detail about the catalogue to the current exhibition at Bibliotheca Wittockiana, the museum in Brussels devoted to bookbindings:

Une vie, une collection. Cinq siècles d'art et d'histoire à travers le livre et sa reliure. Exposition à la Bibliotheca Wittockiana du 10 octobre 2008 au 28 février 2009. Dijon, Editions Faton (Arts & Métiers du livre), 2008. ISBN 978-2-87844-118-5. Texts by Michel Wittock, Paul Culot, Annie De Coster, and Jérôme Callais.

The exhibition not only presents bookbindings from 5 centuries, but also highlights 25 years of bibliophile passion and collecting by the Bibliotheca Wittockiana's founder, Michel Wittock.

The bibliophile visitor who was thinking of a nice getaway might consider Brussels, and instead of letting a myriad of lights blind him or her at overcrowded Chrismas markets, might consider taking a stroll to an elegant corner of town, and being overwhelmed by these riches. During this exhibition, the museum will also be open on Sundays.

Stradanus exhibition: a son of Bruges hailed back in his birth town

If having Honorary Tuscans were a practice in Florence in the early 17th century, Johannes Stradanus (Brugge, 1523- Florence 1605) would have been a serious candidate. He was born here, but died as a Florentine.

Today the draughtsman is celebrated in birth town Brugge (Bruges) with an exhibition: "Johannes Stradanus, hofkunstenaar van de Medici" (Court Artist of the Medici).

Stradanus received training as an artist at Antwerp, and he was found registered there as a member of its famous St Luke's Guild in 1545. Around that time he travelled to Italy to confront his own draughtsman skill with Italian art.

His encounter with a fellow countryman who had been put in charge of the de Medici tapestry production, which aimed at taking the wind out of the sails of Flemish tapestry making, proved decisive. A full career ensued: Stradanus became a commissioned designer for media as varied as tapestries, paintings, single pieces, altar pieces or murals -Francesco de Medici's Studiolo in Palazzo Vecchio for instance, prints, and of course the drawings.

But drawing for prints took center stage in Stradanus' output as of 1576, which explains why the core of the exhibition consists of 122 prints and drawings, placed together in a complementary way. There are borrowings from the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, the Royal Library at Brussels and Windsor Castle. The richness of detail warrants that the spectator gives this enough viewing time.

Perhaps most famous, and documenting craftsmanship in the arts and science in the Late Renaissance, is the series "Nova Reperta" from 1588-1589, consisting of 19 prints. To depict themes such as the invention of oil paint, and the determination of longitude at sea, Stradanus consulted a fair amount of reading material, the literature of his day. But while glorifying discovery, it was not beneath him to color historical fact with his own glasses.

The exhibition also has sculpture, for instance by fellow émigré Giambologna, paintings by Italian artists such as Vasari, who counted on Stradanus as a close collaborator, and three Italian tapestries.

Details: Johannes Stradanus, hofkunstenaar van de Medici, exhibition, Groeningemuseum, Dijver 12, 8000 Brugge. From 9 October 2008 until 4 January 2009. The Groeningemuseum is part of the 1 Euro Museum initiative. Youngsters under the age of 26 pay an entrance fee of 1 Euro.

Photo credit: courtesy of Groeningemuseum. The Hunt for Wild Cats, borrowing from Palazzo Pitti, Florence, after a carton by Stradanus.

Catalogues:
Exhibition manual: Sandra Janssens, Stradanus 1523-1605. Hofkunstenaar van de Medici. No ISBN. Depot D/2008/0546/1. 63 p. Text, color illustrations. Price: 6 Euro.
Scientific study: Stradanus (1523-1605), Court Artist of de Medici. Contributors: Alessandra Baroni Vennucci, Alessandro Cecchi, Albert Elen, Sandra Janssens, Marjolein Leesberg, Lucia Meoni, Manfred Sellink, Gert Jan van der Sman. Brepols, 2008. ISBN 2-503-52996-7. Price: 60 Euro.

Two new exhibitions at Antwerp and Brussels (9 October 2008)

On Thursday 9 October 2008, book lovers in Belgium have what in French is called an embarras du choix: two exhibitions will then be inaugurated, one at Antwerp, the other at Brussels.

The Erfgoedbibliotheek Hendrik Conscience (formerly Stadsbibliotheek or SBA) at Antwerp plays host to an exhibition that was produced in France by the Médiathèque de Strasbourg: Meesters van licht en schaduw. Boekillustraties uit de vijftiende eeuw (Masters of light and shadow. Book illustrations from the 15th century).

Forty-five incunables are shown, illustrating the techniques available to printers in the 15th century.

Three contemporary artists, Pierre Gaucher, Charles Kalt, and Caroline Schwoebel, were asked to produce works in juxtapostition to these book illustrations.

A special event is taking place on 18 October 2008 at 4 pm: a concert of classical music with texts inspired by the poems of Hadewych, and music from the Rhineland from the 15th and 16th centuries.

Details:
Nottebohmzaal, Erfgoedbibliotheek Hendrik Conscience
H.Conscienceplein 4, Antwerpen
From 10 October 2008 until 9 November 2008.
The Bibliotheca Wittockiana has a new reason to celebrate: this museum of private origin, dedicated to the binding, is celebrating its 25th anniversary with an exhibition "A Life, A Collection. 25 Years of Shared Passion".

The passion in question is that of founder Michel Wittock, who started off as a private collector to create a museum later. Although Wittock has handed the helm of the institution to his son Charly a few years ago, he personally selected 250 bindings from a total of about 5,000 holdings.

The selection is set to illustrate some chapters of Wittock's collecting. An evolution of style periods will show what kept the founder in thrall over the past 25 years.

On Thursday 9 October 2008, H.R.H. Princess Mathilde will inaugurate the exhibition.

Details:
Bibliotheca Wittockiana
Rue du Bemel/Bemelstraat 23, 1150 Brussels
From 10 October until 28 February 2009.

Fortsas and perfume: Journées de Mariemont (4&5 October 2008)

The Royal Museum of Mariemont (Musée royal de Mariemont) at Morlanwelz –56 km south of Brussels and 28 km east of Mons – has an attractive roster of activities year-round, as can be inferred from its information bulletin called Bulletin d’information trimestriel (published every three months, free on request).

If anything in this country comes close to the J. Paul Getty Museum, it's Mariemont. The name (‘Mary’s hill’) refers to Charles V’s sister, Mary of Hungary, who built a castle in 1546. The ancient history of this noble abode stopped with a fire in 1794.

In the 19^th C, a family of industrialists called Warocqué, owners of coal mines in the immediate vicinity, built a new stately home amid facilities for their workers. One of the most prolific collectors of this family was Raoul Warocqué, whose collection became the basis of a state-owned museum.

Warocqué’s collection comprised old archeological finds from the region, as well as artefacts from Egypt, the Far East (China, Japan), and the Greek and Roman period, and porcelain from Tournai, now placed in juxtaposition with contemporary ceramics. There is also the arboretum around the museum, dotted with statues, such as Rodin’s Burghers of Calais.

Raoul Warocqué was a bibliophile collector, and Mariemont houses a library of rare printed books, bindings, artist books and original editions, ranging in date from the 15^th until the 21^st century. It also comprises almost 10,000 autograph letters, medals and prints, among others nearly 600 by Félicien Rops.

This year, the Museum opens house on Saturday and Sunday 4 & 5 October 2008 to present the collections from an olfactory standpoint. Les parfums de Mariemont is the organizing theme.

The museum is currently hosting an international exhibition (until 30 November 2008) related to perfume in Antiquity: Parfums de l’Antiquité. La rose et l’encens en Méditerranée. The exhibition shows artefacts from numerous institutions abroad, and has a catalogue that promises new scientific findings.

But back to the Activity Days, which can count on the collaboration of three curators with ties to rare book holdings: Bertrand Federinov, Claude Sorgeloos, and Frédéric Van de Vijver.

Bertrand Federinov is director of the Rare Books Department at Mariemont. Frédéric Van de Vijver is librarian at Mariemont. Both serve as guides on visits to the collection.

Federinov hosts a visit entitled ‘Sentir les livres. Approche olfactive des collections de la Réserve Précieuse.’ (Sunday, 5 October, 3 p.m.) Recently, Federinov compiled a catalogue of imprints from Mons from the Mariemont holdings: Quatre siècles d’imprimerie à Mons. Catalogue des éditions montoises (1580-1815) du Musée royal de Mariemont (monograph no. 12 of Musée royal de Mariemont, no ISBN, legal depot no. D/2004/0451/102).

Van de Vijver hosts two kinds of tours to the holdings. One is ‘Galanterie et raffinement capiteux des livres de la marquise de Pompadour, la comtesse du Barry, Marie Leszcynska et Madame Victoire’ (Saturday, 4 October at 2 p.m., repeated on Sunday at 11 a.m.) and the other is ‘Encens et souffre entremêlées aux parfums libertins dans les salons du Siècle des Lumières. L’encyclopédie de Diderot et d’Alembert, un diffuseur de savoir et d’idées révolutionnaires.’ (Saturday, 4 October at 5 p.m.)

Claude Sorgeloos, director of the Rare Books Department at Belgium’s Royal Library, will guide a tour to the exhibition ‘Renier Chalon, alias Fortsas.’ He will approach it with ‘L’odeur facétieuse du cochon.’ (Saturday 4 October, 4 p.m.)

Sorgeloos is one of the curators of the Fortsas exhibition, which has been running at Mariemont from 5 July 2008 onwards, and which is closing 5 October 2008. So the weekend at Mariemont is the last chance to see it.

Subtitle to the exhibition ‘Renier Chalon, alias Fortsas’ is: ‘Le canular en Belgique: toute une tradition!’ (the hoax in Belgium: an entire tradition). The museum’s website refers to a recent hoax called ‘Bye Bye Belgium’, presented about a year ago by the news department of the state-owned French speaking television network, which caused quite a stir in prime time.

Renier Chalon (1802-1889) was an avid collector of coins and rare books. He was born in Mons, but a quiet administrative career brought him to Brussels, where he was at leisure to pursue his numismatist and bibliophile predilections, as well as his passion for pranks.

Chalon fathered a hoax known under the name of Fortsas, short for a soi-disant Comte de Fortsas, and an equally fictitious sale of the library of this elusive count, which, with catalogue and all, was promised to be held at Binche, on 10 August 1840. Book collectors from all over Europe descended there in vain.

A few other blogs have recently referred to Fortsas, here and here, both without mention of the exhibition at Mariemont, which is said to paint a far more complex picture of Chalon, and which provides a Belgian history of the prank from the 19^th century until this day.

Mariemont has published the following monograph on Chalon: Reinier Chalon alias Fortsas: un érudit malicieux au mitan du XIXe siècle (Monographies du Musée royal de Mariemont no. 16, publishing year: 2008). Authors: François de Callatay, Claude Sorgeloos. ISBN: 2-930469-19-6.

New University Library website and Piranesi exhibition, both at Gent

The University Library of the city of Ghent ("Gent") is as of today (25 September 2008) presenting a newly formatted website.

Noteworthy is the link called 'Schatkamer', where some of the collection's treasures are presented in digitized form, but the holdings are far richer than that.

Around its collection of etchings by the Italian architect Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778) now runs an exhibition, in part curated by the Department of Architecture of the university, with the help of the Royal Library at Brussels.

"Piranesi" opened on 20 September, and runs until 18 January 2009 at the Museum voor Schone Kunsten.

"The Jewish Book in a Christian World": International Conference at Antwerp (25-27 June, 2008)

With the recently inaugurated exhibition "Hebraica veritas: Sprak God Hebreeuws? (did God Speak Hebrew, see our April 25, 2008 post)" up and running until August 17, 2008, the Plantin-Moretus Museum (MPM) is about to close its Spring season festively with the international conference "The Jewish Book in a Christian World" (25-27 June, 2008).

Apart from MPM and the University of Antwerp's IJS (Institute of Jewish Studies), co-organizers are the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies of the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, PA), and the Universitair Centrum Sint-Ignatius at Antwerp (UCSIA).

Keynote lecturer at 5 pm on Wednesday at the City Hall of Antwerp is Princeton professor of Renaissance history and the history of scholarship, Anthony Grafton. Grafton's first book was an intellectual biography of Joseph Scaliger. He's been a frequent visitor at the University of Leiden, where he received an honorary doctorate in 2006, and where he has found colleagues to edit Scaliger's collected letters. The University of Leiden Library has a Scaliger Institute to promote research of its holdings.

This blogger has some interesting links in connection with Grafton's latest book, Codex in Crisis. It's a bibliophile edition limited to 250 copies based on an article from the New Yorker in which Grafton expresses to what extend some reserve is due about digitization.

On Thursday June 26, 2008, two sessions will be held at this conference: "The Printing of the Hebrew Bible and Judaica in Antwerp and the Low Countries" (morning) and "Christian Publishers and Readers of Hebrew Literature (afternoon). Location is the Print Room at the Plantin-Moretus Museum (morning) and University of Antwerp's Hof van Liere (afternoon).

A morning session on Friday June 27, 2008 will close the conference: "The Impact of Print on Jewish Culture." Location that day is the University of Antwerp's Hof van Liere. The conference will be held entirely in English. Admission is free, but registration is mandatory.

Illustration: cover of the exhibition catalogue of Hebraica veritas. Book design of the catalogue by Louis van den Eede, who drew the front cover's design by hand. Details: Hebraica veritas. Christoffel Plantijn en de Christelijke Hebraïsten. Catalogus bij de tentoonstelling: Hebraica veritas. Sprak God Hebreeuws? Antwerpen, Museum Plantin-Moretus/Prentenkabinet, 16 mei-17 augustus 2008. No ISBN. Inquiries should be made at the museum.

Exhibition "Florent Rousseau" at Bibliotheca Wittockiana (24 May-30 August, 2008)

The Bibliotheca Wittockiana grew out of the private collection of bookbindings of Belgian bibliophile and collector Michel Wittock. It was turned into a museum, devoted to the binding, with opening hours, at one of Brussels' most leafy boroughs.
The best source about this collection is the Festschrift Bibliophilies et reliures. Mélanges offerts à Michel Wittock (2006) in the museum's own Studia series (no.6). 520 pages, cloth. No ISBN. Inquiries can be made at the museum.

Wittock gathered a collection of rare books and bindings, but the contemporary binding, increasingly a focus in his collecting, has always been a particular focus for exhibitions. Here is Florent Rousseau. Reliures de creation 1998-2008. It opened May 24, 2008, and runs until August 30, 2008. A selection of bindings from French bookbinder Florent Rousseau’s production are shown.

In the second half of 2007, the periodical of the Société royale des bibliophiles et iconophiles de Belgique (SRBIB) -this is the Royal Society of Bibliophiles and Iconophiles of Belgium, based at Brussels- published an article of Florent Rousseau's, actually a talk that he had delivered at Tournai in 2006: Etat actuel de la reliure en France. In Le livre et l'estampe (2007), vol.53 no.168, p.127-159 (BE ISSN 0024-533 x). It's an excellent article: clear, informative.

Florent Rousseau founded AIR neuf, Association internationale de relieurs, in 1995, and today he initiated a new group called APPAR, Association pour la promotion des arts de la reliure. With APPAR, he responds to a rift that he detected between amateur bookbinders and professional ones, on the one hand, and to attitudes pro or counter the classical French heritage of bookbinding on the other.

Starting with Marius Michel at the cusp of the 20th century, Rousseau gives an overview, in which all the famous bookbinders from a golden age of French bookbinding are mentioned. The period of Decorative Arts yielded an intense collaboration between famous French authors, artists, bookbinders, and their collectors. Most of the bookbinders then were like fashion designers: no craftsmen, but responsible for the concept. One of them, Paul Bonet, was both: fashion and binding designer. Collaboration with separate doreurs or gilders was customary.

Ironically, collectors are deemed responsible by Rousseau for a turn away by bookbinders from a tradition that had become somewhat stilted. Collectors had demanded too much of a good thing, a binding with sleeves and etui that continued to be influenced by the same arts, and that had become "purely academical".

There was a tendency among the binders who did ply their craft in person, starting from the late 1970s, to reject tradition altogether. New currents came into existence with no link to tradition. With AIR neuf, Rousseau wanted to provide a typology for the innovations. Collectors meanwhile did not place orders with just any adept of radical change. But exploration of the binding by the artisan bookbinder did yield some technical riches for the craft.

Structure became the magic word. Binders showed the construction of the book, no back, no carton, no more guards. No gilding. No hierarchy as to types of leather, and a turn to less expensive kinds of leather. No more sleeves, no étui, but boxes, and use of wood. But little by little, new references to tradition were made, but by artisans adept with paper and decors who were able to improvise, to work with color and contrasts. Rousseau is one of them.

Over time, amateur bookbinders got more limelight than the professional craftsmen, but only because their work rarely is the subject of exhibitions. In APPAR, Rousseau is hoping to unite both. French bookbinding is pretty vibrant these days, and Rousseau is adamant to keep it that way.

24 hrs in Brussels "boring"? Not so for book lovers.

Last March, Brussels was voted most boring city on a layover. One thing is fairly certain: the international travelers coming to this conclusion have no predilection for the book.

We have reported about the current exhibitions at the Royal Library of Brussels (KBR) and the Erasmus House. We suggest a day of sightseeing for the book lover or bibliophile (who can furthermore contact this curator to inquire about stops at bookstores and eateries).

We suggest that the book lover starts the day at the Erasmus House in the morning, with a visit to the exhibition "The Anatomy of Vanities" and its beautiful garden (see June 6, 2008 post). This exhibition was initially running until July 13, 2008 only, but word reached this curator that it has been extended. It now runs until the end of August.

By metro, the book lover travels to the center and to the Royal Library for the exhibition in the Nassau Chapel about 20 eminent historical collectors whose books became part of the holdings (see our April 24, and March 10, 2008 posts). It runs until August 24, 2008.

In the afternoon, the book lover takes the metro to Montgomery Square, and strolls along a district reminiscent of Paris 16 to Bibliotheca Wittockiana, a private museum devoted to bindings (this curator can be contacted about an ice cream parlor nearby - reward after a satisfying day).

See our next post for coverage of its current exhibition with bindings by French bookbinder Florent Rousseau. Illustration: binding by Florent Rousseau (courtesy of the Wittockiana). Below: a book lover, caught reading by the window in uptown Brussels.

Exhibition "The Anatomy of Vanities" (Erasmus' House, Brussels, April 24-July 13, 2008)

The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton got published in 1621, and the Erasmus' House in Brussels currently has an exhibition called The Anatomy of Vanities (April 12, 2008-July 13, 2008). Burton's medical treatise and the exhibition have in common a medical subject and an unusual breadth of approach. In the case of the exhibition, we add staggering beauty.

The son of a French luxury goods scion quipped that he sees the best contemporary galleries in each city he visits on business. Why not a pars pro toto at the Erasmushouse with the works of Jan Fabre and Marie-Jo Lafontaine, in rooms that have recently been repainted. Why not the museum's garden with permanent works of art, amongst others Les larmes du ciel by Marie-Jo Lafontaine. With a spoonful of contemporary art, a medicine of memento mori goes down.
This exhibition fits one of the themes that the Erasmushouse under its director Alexandre Vanautgaerden sets out to explore as of 1998: the cabinet of rarities or vanities, which it sees as a predecessor of the museum. The cabinets brought together works or art, natural or exotic fauna and flora, and scientific instruments.

Such cabinets were in vogue after Erasmus' time, but, as gathered from Vanautgaerden's introduction to the catalogue, Erasmus' contemporary Albrecht Dürer started his Wunderkammer with elements from a trip to.. the Netherlands. Cabinet elements are present here, organised around the concept of idleness or vanity.

In Erasmus' days, death was more pressing than in ours, the reminder more common. Erasmus, who was somewhat sickly, wore a ring with the Latin inscription 'concedo nulli', 'I yield to no one', a direct reference to man's natural fate from the standpoint of a personified Death.

The take on death in this exhibition is to understand it with a certain jubilation, by lingering to take in past and present moments of beauty, and by seeing the attempts to fixate or represent life in the name of curiosity.

Bright green parrots from the Museum of Natural History at Tournai are laid around a skull in garland fashion. The skeleton and the snake are omnipresent in delicately wooden or ivory sculpted figurines or heads. There are plant arrangements by a Brussels florist, leaving room for ongoing microscopic processes in glasshouse conditions. and there's the human desire to push the limits of technique in exquisite mechanically turned objects of ivory and wood.

In an essay from the catalogue, Jean-Marc Mandosio traces man's preoccuption with the anatomical model through time. The models of women, the Venuses or Evas, as he explains, were always represented full-bodied, with skin, unlike the Adams. Their shape was an ideal, and in stark contrast with the entrails and organs you could still remove.

The collector who gave these strange and beautiful objects on loan, acutely phrases how despite our ability to prolong life, and to taunt it with the most fantastical creations, clinging to it will be as vain as in the time of Erasmus. If to the vistor this comes as too great a shock, there are always the editions of Erasmus on view on the second floor, or a moment's pause in the philosophical garden of the museum to regain spirits.

As a visitor, you take these beautiful objects home in the shape of the catalogue: Anatomie des vanités. Anatomie der ijdelheden. Sous la direction de - onder leiding van Alexandre Vanautgaerden. Bilingual catalogue French-Dutch. Le Cabinet d'Erasme VI (2008). 93 p. color ills. ISBN 978-2-930414-22-5. Exhibition until July 13, 2008. Erasmus House and garden, open every day except Mondays (Photos: museum website).
PS: Belgium is a country of collectors-the exhibition Hout in boeken (see our March 10, 2008 post) featured another collector's 17th C set of thinly turned woodcups -a marvel. See Charles Indekeu's article "Ornamentdraaiwerk. Machinekunst voor vorsten" (p. 315-325) in the study Hout in boeken (see our April 24, 2008 post) as a complement to the catalogue of the Erasmushouse exhibition.

Exhibition "Hout in boeken" (Wood in Books) at Leuven (1-31 March 2008)

The Theology Department of the University of Leuven houses an interesting Rare books and manuscripts collection, better known as the Maurits Sabbebibliotheek (MSB). One of their subcollections is the Jesuitica collection. The Maurits Sabbe Library is also known for its charismatic librarians, who once in a while set up exhibitions on their premises.

Most fastidious and prolific among them is Luc Knapen, organizer of the current exhibition Hout in boeken, houten boeken (1-31 March, 2008, to travel to Hasselt in May and possibly in part on to London), a full day of conferences around this theme (29 February, 2008), and the executive editor of a scientific study, forthcoming from Peeters Publishers. Here is Luc Knapen at the opening, receiving the first copy of the study.
As we can see, it promises to be richly documented.
Apart from numerous artefacts, xylaria, and the results of wood turners' work, the pièce the résistance in the exhibition is the reconstruction of a lathe, or a wood turners instrument, based on a Jesuit emblem from 1627. Photo: Luc Knapen, Maurits Sabbebibliotheek.
Cultura Fonds is proud to have an Antiphonary/Responsory on loan in the exhibition. This manuscript (grand in-folio) is dated 1503 (Princedom of Liège, Meuse region), and has a binding and rich illumination pointing to use by Crosiers. This copy is currently under further examination.Another interesting artefact is this revolving book stand or bookwheel, on loan from the University of Ghent Library. A restoration of this piece of furniture was possible specifically for this exhibition.

Provenance research in Belgium today

The Royal Library of Belgium currently has a noteworthy exhibition on show: In de ban van boeken. Grote verzamelaars uit de 19e eeuw in de Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België - Les seigneurs du livre. Les grands collectionneurs du XIXème siècle à la Bibliothèque royale de Belgique (February 1, 2008-August 24, 2008, Nassaukapel).

The opening was preceded by a half day of lectures about Private Collections in Belgium (1750-1850). Some of our finest book historians delivered talks: Pierre Delsaerdt (Antwerp), Carmélia Opsomer (Liège), Bart Op de Beeck (Brussels), Ludo Vandamme (Bruges), Claude Sorgeloos (Brussels), and Jan Pauwels (Brussels). Talks were moderated by Stijn Van Rossem (Antwerp), who's preparing a PhD on the Verdussen printers.

The exhibition highlights twenty 19th-century collectors, from abroad (e.g. Richard Heber) and from the young nation state that Belgium was or was going to become. The period was marked by four regimes in a time spanning two generations.

The collections of these twenty collectors captured a fraction of collections changing hands or at peril of calamity, following the abolition of monasteries and their libraries at the end of the Ancien Régime (around 1797). Either these collectors donated directly (too few of them), or their books and manuscripts were acquired in auctions, not without a degree of vicissitude, for the newly inaugurated national library (from 1837 onwards).

Provenance research is increasingly becoming a focus in several public institutions in this country. The lecturers stressed the importance of noting the markings in copies, for a better understanding of how collections developed. The online catalogue of our National Library for instance gives extensive provenance data for each copy, and the Short Title Catalogus Vlaanderen may soon follow suit.