Belgian artist, visionary, inventor, actionist (1940-2019) Panamarenko would have celebrated his 85th birthday this year and 2 Antwerp flagship museums KMSKA (Museum of Fine Arts) and MHKA (Museum of Modern Art) have timed exhibitions about his work to coincide with this date. Exhibitions that are best viewed in tandem. In his report for Art Reporter Belgium, artist and guide Igor Biloushchenko will talk about both exhibitions and the powerful figure of Panamarenko, an artist who, through his work, inspired viewers to get off the ground and soar, to follow their dreams.

Panamarenko is a representative of post-war European art of 1960 generation, like his contemporaries, believing in the power of progress and science, who grew up on science fiction in the era of space exploration. Although none of his works flew for more than 3 seconds, but circled and fell, sometimes with him – he gave us the possibility of the dream of ‘flying off the Earth’. In each of his creations he is first and foremost a poet and an artist. Engineering, which he never learnt, is in the background. Panamarenko left us the mystery of his pseudonym – whether Soviet General Panteleimon Panamarenko or Pan American Airlines. Probably a bit of both.

In the 1960s, the artist and his best friend Hugo Heyrman marked the beginning of a new era with their provocative actions. I would like to focus on his most famous happening (today the word ‘performance’ is more popular):

In 1968, Panamarenko and his comrades (VAGA – Free Action Group Antwerp) erected real barricades of ice cubes on Conscienceplein, demanding that the square be turned into a pedestrian zone. ‘Ice cubes action.’ Their demand – to make this small square in the centre of Antwerp car-free – was realised through a brief (the ice cubes melted on the golas) but spectacular happening. Later they proposed to turn the existing bomb shelter under Groenplaats into a centre for contemporary art. At the beginning of July 1968 the Antwerp administration makes a fundamental decision to make the square pedestrian. And only in 1972 (in Belgium everything is done slowly) Hendrik Conscience Square became the first car-free zone in the heart of the city.

The exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Antwerp ‘Panamarenko – ‘Journey to the Stars’ not only gives an opportunity to see large-scale installations by the visionary artist, but also a glimpse into his passion of the last years of his life. And the case was like this:

The artist Panamarenko lived all his life with his mother, who understood nothing (or pretended to) about his art, but was terribly proud that his only son was written about in newspapers and talked about on radio and TV. When his mum passed away, in 2003, he happily married Eveline Hoorens a 40 years younger. Even outwardly they were very much suited to each other – there is something childlike in them, the ability to wonder and enjoy the world.

Eveline comes from a family of coffee traders. The ‘Hoorens’ coffee brand goes back to 1928 and is famous in Antwerp. Even its slogan suits a woman who looks like both Marilyn Monroe and Pappy Longstocking: ‘Enjoy your Coffee’.

When Panamarenko officially announced his retirement in 2005 (it was also a happening), he was being sly. In essence, the artist immersed himself in his wife’s family business. He created a whole line of ‘gift coffee’ from Panamarenko, of course with images from his flying, airy, spacefaring work. In the Museum near the ticket office you can see/buy the company’s coffee