The sixth edition of the ARTONOV Festival will take place in European capital Brussels, in various Art Nouveau, Art Deco and other remarkable architectural venues. This year’s central theme is “what the day owes to the night”.
With this 6th edition, from the 4th to the 11th of October 2020, the ARTONOV Festival is more committed than ever to surprise the audience with a unique program, thanks to the motivation of the festival team, the artists and the partner venues.
This year’s program has been adapted to comply with the current health and safety regulations while maintaining the theme, “what the day owes to the night,” as well as the sense of artistic adventure that is in the festival’s DNA since the very beginning.
Uniting East and West, the artists of this edition seize the light and enchant it, revealing a world of multiple transparencies.
The lockdown has been a challenge for us all, as individuals, communities, and as a society as a whole. It is time to bring light to this dark period and engage again in cultural events. A new wind blows through this special edition thanks to the presence of the young Belgian and international artistic generation.
This year, the organizers are also opting for venues of a more contemporary architectural style, such as COOP in Anderlecht, where director, choreographer and visual artist Isabella Soupart and music director, pianist and Steve Reich specialist Guy Vandromme will present Stretch/Timemonochromes, a continuous 4 hour performance.
See U in Ixelles, a former gendarmerie barracks, will host the granvat collective and their performance Come on Feet, which combines the power and improvisation of underground dance cultures with contemporary dance techniques.
Art Nouveau lovers have still plenty to look forward to. At the Bibliothèque Solvay, Médéric Collignon and Vincent Courtois’ impressive jazz duo presents a celebration of tactile sound; they return with a mix of urban noises, beat-box and improvisations, playing the present time with their past’s baggage.
In the Maison Saint-Cyr by architect Gustave Strauven, a multi-sensory discovery for a limited privileged audience, with musician Catalina Vicens on organetto and olfactory installations by perfume designer and visual artist Lisa Goldberg.
Goldberg will also intervene at Chez Pias, the modernist building of the former printing house of the newspaper Le Peuple by architects Bernard and Maxime Brunfaut. Together with Michaël Grébil Liberg (medieval lute, voice and electronics) they will present a poetic performance dedicated to light and darkness.
The Art Nouveau era will also be in the spotlight at the Hôtel Max Hallet. Ensemble Dialoghi (on period instruments) will perform Francis Poulenc’s complete works for wind instruments –with texts brought by Antoine Pecqueur – spread out over two concerts.
One of this year’s highlights will no doubt be the performance at the National Bank Museum dedicated to a work from the Bank’s art collection with Wim Van Hasselt and Koen Plaetinck’s ART’uur. This duo collaborates with various interdisciplinary artists and makes use of new digital platforms. Equipped with multiple trumpets, a strange diversity of percussions and an overflow of electronics, they conceive a new sound universe.
And finally, a special new feature will be the presence of the circus arts. Jeanne Mordoj will present the outcome of her one-week residency in the Hectolitre building, a former swingers club in Brussels.