The work of Marcel Broodthaers, one of the fathers of surrealism, comes to the Antwerp Museum

22 October 2019 - 19 January 2020
Antwerpen

Until 19 January 2020, the Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp (MHKA) will be organising a major exhibition dedicated to the career of the Belgian artist Marcel Broodthaers: "Soleil Politique". A surrealist vision filled with 'belgitude'...

Marcel Broodthaers was a poet and visual artist until his death in 1976. Considered one of the most influential Belgian artists in history, his pots of mussels are still emblematic all around the world. "A work by Broodthaers is a joy to behold. But his humour is never for free or without engagement. He forces you to reflect. His works are exercises in interpretation," explains Bart de Baere, Director of the MHKA Museum.

Active in the milieu of the Brussels Surrealists, of which René Magritte was the leading figure, this only child of a Flemish father, a maître d', and a Walloon mother, left an almost unclassifiable work to posterity. His creations are made up of texts, objects, assemblages, accumulations (egg shells, bricks, moulds, etc.) where humour and absurdity are blended together.

The works presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp have already been the subject of a travelling exhibition in recent years, visiting New York, Sofia and Madrid, among others. But the artist's work will also be approached from an Antwerp angle, the museum curator promises us. And one of his latest installations, "Décor: A conquest by Marcel Broodthaers", will be exhibited for the first time in Belgium.

A retrospective of a complex, erudite and humorous artist which is not to be missed!