ReportageIt is in this restored Art Deco marvel that the Boghossian Foundation has set up an art center. A place that this dynasty of diamond dealers of Armenian origin long established in Lebanon wishes to build a bridge between East and West. And a refuge for artists from the Arab world.
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In the chic and somewhat austere district of Solbosch, in the south-east of Brussels, where the opulent and discreet villas stand like big sleeping cats along the deserted avenues, a single sign with a fluorescent neon tube pierces the mist. « Art is the answer », ensures the message on the pediment of the Villa Empain. Art is the answer, but to what? To the grief of the Brussels drizzle, to the vortex into which the Covid-19 has precipitated our lives, to the climatic anxiety or to the desire for murder that drips from social networks?
« Art is the answer. » What was the question again? It may be found in the title of the current exhibition: « How will it end ? (is not the question) ». “How will this end? (That’s not the problem). “Behind this pretty enigmatic title, some forty Lebanese artists offer their vision of the disaster at work in the country of the Cedars. The very 1930s decor of the villa hosting the exhibition is perfectly suited to this end of the world in slow motion, this remake of Titanic at the scale of a country. Premonitions, nightmares, escapes, visions: the scenography advances on a thread but never falls into the trap of fascination with the beauty of disaster.
Armenian, Turkish, Greek, Kurdish, Arabic cultures
In Brussels, the Villa Empain is a haven in the small world of contemporary art. Conferences, school visits and concerts are organized there. Evenings with DJs welcome a public a priori unaccustomed to this district of embassies. Students from the neighboring art school, La Cambre, sometimes hang out there. People under 25 make up a quarter of entries. The Flemings, major consumers of contemporary art, represent one in three visitors – much more than in other French-speaking institutions.
It is not the least pride of this place dedicated to East-West dialogue to contribute a little to reduce community prejudices in Belgium. The exhibition on Lebanese art is no exception. At the Villa Empain, Armenian, Turkish, Greek, Kurdish, Arab cultures are evoked… In this Brussels Art Deco setting, we always look towards Beirut, Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo, the past of these cities and what is remains… A small oriental Villa Medici in Europe.
Villa Empain is now the headquarters of the Boghossian Foundation, a charitable and artistic institution created and directed by two Lebanese brothers of Armenian origin, Jean and Albert Boghossian, sons of a family that made a fortune in diamonds. So, where to start: the history of the Boghossians or that of the Empains, the Armenian genocide, the Lebanese tragedy or Belgian history?
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