Publiek Park: Jef Cornelis / Léonard Pongo
’25
Plantentuin Meise
Balat-serre
Nieuwelaan 38
B-1860 Meise
Balatkas © Michiel De Cleene
Plantentuin Meise
Balat-serre
Nieuwelaan 38
B-1860 Meise
Art Cinema OFFoff has the honor to close the third edition of Publiek Park (June 27 — September 28) with a film program in the unique setting of the Balat Greenhouse at the Botanic Garden in Meise.
The Balat Greenhouse was designed in 1854 by Alphonse Balat, the court architect of King Leopold II, to grow giant water lilies. This historical greenhouse is one of the most iconic structures of the botanic garden. The building served as a study for the Royal Greenhouses of Laeken which Balat would later design.
In The Royal Greenhouses of Laeken, Jef Cornelis lets the camera slowly examine Balat’s huge complex of glass domes, long galleries and monumental pavilions, including the Congo Greenhouse. Léonard Pongo, living between Brussels and Kinshasa, returns the gaze with Tales from the Source, exploring the landscapes and flora of the Democratic Republic of Congo as an ageless and intelligent living entity. Driven by an original musical composition by André Laporte and Bear Bones, Lay Low, respectively, both audiovisual works avoid a voice-over or spoken text.
Publiek Park is a nomadic contemporary art project which explores public city parks and gardens as exhibition grounds. This event marks our third collaboration, following analog open-air screenings during the first and second editions of Publiek Park in Ghent (2021) and Antwerp (2023).
Timetable
- 17:00 Last chance to visit the exhibition through a guided tour with the curators and writer Lana Jones – Entrance Botanic Garden, Nieuwelaan 38
- 19:00 Food and drinks at the Balat Greenhouse
- 20:00 Film screening in the Balat Greenhouse (60′)
- 22:00 Closing time of the Botanic Garden
Jef Cornelis
De Koninklijke serres van Laken 1877-1902
The Royal Greenhouses of Laeken, Brussels consist of a huge complex of several heated dome-shaped greenhouses in iron and glass that are connected by glass-roofed galleries in the park where the neo-classical Royal Palace of Laeken is located. Together, these monumental pavilions, glass domes and long galleries make up one of the showpieces of the golden age of Belgian architecture during the reign of king Leopold II (1865−1909). The complex was designed by the Belgian architect Alphonse Balat (1818−1895) and, thanks to the use of new materials and the introduction of decorative motifs, it represents a first step towards Art Nouveau that was further developed by Victor Horta, who served as an apprentice to Balat.
To a certain extent, the film by Jef Cornelis seems to apply Balat’s motto: “Simplify, then simplify, always simplify and when you will have simplified everything, you won’t have simplified enough yet”. In fact, Cornelis seems to come back to the cinematic style of his early architectural trilogy (Alden Biezen, 1964; Abdij van Park Heverlee, 1964; Plus d’Honneur que d’Honneurs, 1965). The camera slowly examines the silhouettes of the Royal Greenhouses while the composition and musical performance by André Laporte (1931) – who also worked at BRT from 1979 to 1989, first as a music producer, then as a program coordinator, becoming in 1989 director of production for the BRT Philharmonic Orchestra – are both minimal and concrete.
Finally, together with the screenwriter Geert Bekaert, Cornelis presents the Greenhouses as an ecosystem of flora quietly growing rampant, a perfectly balanced aggregate of concrete, glass and metal, which would become a source of inspiration for a new architectural movement.
De Koninklijke serres van Laken © VRT, courtesy Argos centre for audiovisual arts
Léonard Pongo
Tales from the Source
Tales from the Source offers a gaze on the landscapes of the Democratic Republic of Congo to translate a sense of its unfathomable power, diversity and knowledge. The scenery is presented as a character acting as a living entity and inhabited by the symbolism of Congolese traditions. The visual approach borrows techniques from multispectral imaging, resulting in an otherworldly experience with surreal lights and colour. Combined with an original musical composition by Bear Bones, Lay Low, we enter into a sensory dialogue with the landscape, an intelligent, ageless being in constant transformation that challenges our perception.
Tales from the Source © Auguste Orts
De Koninklijke serres van Laken © VRT, courtesy Argos centre for audiovisual arts
19th-century Balat Greenhouse with the giant water lily Victoria Regia, archival photo property of the Belgian State, on permanent loan to Plantentuin Meise.
Archival photo property of the Belgian State, on permanent loan to Plantentuin Meise.