In the Land of Comicstrip

by Bibek Sengupta  |   Published in ANANDAMELA in 2007, Kolkata.

What do cartoons Tintin, The Smurfs, Spirou, Lucky Luke, Gaston Lagaffe have in common? They all sprang from Brussels.With the Cartoon Museum, the CartoonFilm Festival and the Cartoon Murals turning up on walls throughout Brussels, there is every reason to call Brussels The land of comicstrip.

Many of them came about by the comic book editor and magazine publishing houses of Dupuis, Lombard and Casterman in Brussels. Dupuis started publishing the weekly magazine Spirou in 1938; Lombard the weekly Tintin in 1946. Originally intended for the Belgium audience, they soon conquered France, and then, in a post war boom, the rest of the world. Hergé leads with several hundred million comic books printed.

Statue of comic charcter Gaston near Comic strip Centre

The Brussels Comic Book Route: is a path composed by several comic strip murals which deck the walls of several buildings throughout the inner City of Brussels as well as the neighborhoods of Laeken and Auderghem. The large comic strip murals show motifs of the most famous and popular Belgian comics, for instance The Adventures of Tintin, Lucky Luke, Gaston, Marsupilami and Gil Jourdan. The project began in 1991 by initiative of the local authorities of the city of Brussels in collaboration with the Belgian Comic Strip Center. At its beginning, the project only intended to embellish empty walls and gables of buildings in the city. It then became an opportunity to remember that many well-known comic artists around the world were linked to Belgium's capital.

Mural of Hergé's Quick and Flupke

Today, the Brussels' Comic Book Route offers more than 50 mural paintings, most of them located inside the Pentagon (as the city center is often called due to its geometrical shape). Following its trail, the Comic Book Route is a good way to discover the capital of bande dessinée, or "comic strip".

The most recent mural of Franquin's Spirou

But there seems to be more. The whole of Brussels, and perhaps the whole of Belgium, seems to be cartoon-strip mad. The Center for Cartoon Strips in Brussels inventories 650 professional comic artists in Belgium. For a country of only 10 million inhabitants, this constitutes the largest concentration of cartoonists per square kilometer in the world.

About The Belgian Comic Strip Centre: Walking the streets of Brussels, you encounter cartoon stores selling Tintin paraphernalia. And, there is a real museum: the Belgian Comic Strip Centre. It houses in a former department store built by Belgian Art Nouveau architect Victor Horta, covering over 4,000 square meter of original scripts, memorabilia, models and animations.


Magical Walkthrough from manuscript to doodles to sketches to final copy

The love for strip cartoons has become manifest in the streets of Brussels by a special project, creating huge cartoon-strip murals in the streetscapes of this city that could be called the capital of Europe.Organised by the Brussels city authorities, with the help of the Belgian Comic Strip Centre.

Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée (Brussels Comics Strip Museum)

Hergé died in 1983, Edgar P. Jacobs in 1987, Rob-Vel in 1991, Peyo in 1992, Franquin in 1997 and Morris in 2001. The end of an era? Maybe not, the comics are being very well read, and the people from Brussels cherish their past in the streetscapes of their city. Perhaps they will start seeing themselves as comic capital of the world as well. Marc Renders of the Comic Strip Centre: "The Belgian comic strip sector is more and more developing and positively influencing the tourism and local cultural activities. The comic strip is one of Brussels’ most attracting cultural activities."

- Photographs by Bibek Sengupta, 2015.

[Thank You Ms. Sanda Kaufman, Cleveland State University, for allowing me to use the photograph of Brussels Street's Art Mural for my article]
[ Also view the Photo Gallery of Wim de Koning Gans]