The Centre de la Marionnette of the Federation Wallonia-Brussels has established itself as a driving force in developing digital arts in the service of puppetry. Each edition of LUMEN showcases this unique alliance, exploring how technologies enrich and reinvent the art of puppetry. The event offers an immersion in hybrid forms where the puppeteer’s gesture converses with code, projected imagery, and robotic devices.
This tenth edition, LUMEN#10, is dedicated to Philippe Franck, director of Transcultures, whose vision and counsel have guided this pioneering event’s trajectory from the outset.
Including, among others:
- Immersive installations: The Thread, a video installation by Hans Op de Beeck, and Interval, an interactive sound installation by Collectif Superbe.
- Emerging creations: The Émergences numériques exhibition showcases young talent.
- Performances: OPEN HA.I.KU, a workshop-performance by Company Pseudonymo, explores poetic writing with an AI. Daniel Simu presents Acrobot, a performance where robotics meets acrobatics.
Professional sessions: A Hackathon Lab on robotics and AI.
Installations
The Thread – Hans op de Beeck (B)
Vidéo
Immersion into the world of Hans Op de Beeck, with a video that turns the space into a poetic stage for an immersive experience.
The Thread is a visual love poem about a punk girl and boy who grow old together, keeping each other alive with a needle and thread. Here, love and death go hand in hand.
Formally and thematically, the film references traditional Japanese Bunraku theatre, where master puppeteers dressed in black manipulate large puppets to create a (tragic) love story.
The work was originally developed for Espace Louis Vuitton in Tokyo as a special commission for the Le Fil Rouge project.
Hans Op de Beeck is an internationally renowned Belgian visual artist. His multidisciplinary practice spans sculpture, installation, video, photography, drawing, and writing. He creates immersive environments and human figures, often in black and white and suffused with melancholy, that invite contemplation and reflection on the human condition. His work explores themes of memory, loss, isolation, and the transience of existence.
Interval – Superbe (B)
Installation sonore interactive
An interactive symphony where your gestures bring the harps to life!
Interval is an interactive musical installation composed of four harps fitted with automatic mechanisms that activate only when a presence is detected. Visitors who venture into the space trigger rotating arms that sweep across the instruments’ strings.
Each harp has its own melody, forming a harmonious ensemble whose rhythm evolves continuously. The installation converses with the art of puppetry by exploring manipulation, movement, and sensory storytelling.
Superbe is a multidisciplinary artist duo exploring the boundaries between visual art, sound art, and interactive installations. Their creations are marked by refined aesthetics, inventive uses of technology, and a strong immersive dimension. They present installations and performances that invite audiences into a sensory and poetic experience, fully engaging both body and mind.
Émergences numériques
The exhibition “Émergences numériques” is a showcase for innovative works by emerging artists from our partner art schools. Through a wide range of installations, these young artists boldly probe the frontiers of contemporary art. Their creations testify to the vitality of the emerging scene, addressing themes from technological potential to today’s social issues.
This exhibition offers these artists a crucial platform to experiment and push the limits of their medium. The works presented forge close links with the art of puppetry by exploring manipulation, movement, storytelling, and representation.
In partnership with ESA – Académie des Beaux-Arts de Tournai.
Usine à poésie — Anaëlle Hennaut
Anaëlle Hennaut, an artist from Mouscron and a graduate in Digital Arts from the Académie des Beaux-Arts de Tournai, explores the Poetry Factory (Usine à poésie). Her work weaves shadow and light, industrial landscapes and intense output, across light sculptures, videos, animations, drawings, and collages. She fuses visual gesture and poetic writing, probing the ties between text, image, and sound, while engaging with class struggle and working conditions.
Au coin du feu — Antoine Leclercq
“Au Coin du Feu” is Antoine Leclercq’s stop-motion short film, the fruit of seven months’ work at the Académie des Beaux-Arts de Tournai. The film dives into the world of the Scouts, following three young explorers around a campfire for a special Halloween episode.
Conceived and created by Antoine Leclercq, the project uses 3D printing and reclaimed materials. It is intended as the pilot for a future animated series.
Festival Lumen - Marionnettes & Arts numériques
Lumen, a flagship event where puppets and digital arts meet at the Centre of the Puppet Art. The programming of each edition is family and free! Each of the editions invites the public to discover surprising, poetic and unique universes.
During Lumen #8, for 10 days, around ten works by emerging or confirmed artists, from the Wallonia-Brussels Federation and elsewhere will be visible to discover the art of manipulation of objects, images, of bodies under the eye of digital arts. Lumen focuses this year on Zaven Paré, visual artist, precursor of the electronic puppet.
Informations
- 02 > 26.10.2025
Opening 8 oct. 2025 @ 18:30. - Centre de la Marionnette de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles
- Rue Saint-Martin 47 – 7500 Tournai – Belgique
- Installations accessibles grauitement selon les heures d’ouverture du musée.
- maisondelamarionnette.be
Production
- Centre de la Marionnette
- With the support of: Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (arts numériques), de l’ESA, de la Maison de la culture de Tournai et de Transcultures
