Searching for Street Art in Brussels

When we planned to visit Brussels, our main goal was to visit the beautiful Christmas markets. But along the way, we discovered some fabulous street art as well.

Besides popping into numerous chocolate shops (Yum!), we wandered around many small side streets and found a city filled with fun, colorful cartoons and murals on many of its buildings. Before our trip, I had read that Brussels was known for its comic book characters such as Rin Tin Tin, but I still had no idea. These delightful characters also play a major part in the city’s Comic Book Route, which features large murals paying homage to Belgian comic artists.

Let’s take a tour of Brussel’s street art scene!

Comic Book Route

One of the most fun and unusual ways to explore Brussels is by taking the Comic Book Route. The project started in 1991 with the intention to embellish empty walls in the city, while paying tribute to famous Belgian comic artists. The route itself features over 50 mural paintings from iconic greats to lesser-known characters. You can find a map of the route here.

Here are a couple of the comic book murals that we found:

The Broussaille Wall and Olivier Rameau & friends mural Rue du Chêne

The Broussaille Wall was the first comic strip mural to be painted in July 1991. The wall illustrates a cheerful couple, Broussaille and his girlfriend, going for a brisk walk around the city. Based on a comic series created by Frank Pé, the series was first published in 1978 in the local Spirou magazine.

Victor Sackville Wall

Rue du Marché au Charbon

Not too far from the Broussaille Wall is the Victor Sackville Wall. The scene on the wall comes from The Opera of Death, the first comic of the Code Zimmerman series created by Francis Carin in 1985. The mural depicts the main character Victor Sackville, a British spy that lands in Brussels, on the Rue du Marché au Charbon as it looked during WWI.

Spike and Suzy

Rue de Laeken 111

Without stopping peeing, the Manneken Pis, the famous symbol of Brussels, holds five of Belgium's best-known comic strip heroes in one hand.

Manneken Pis

Be prepared to fight off hordes of tourists to see one of Brussel’s “little” attractions – the Manneken Pis (“little pee man” in Flemish). The peeing boy is a small, bronze, 17^th-century fountain statue that measures just 61cm (24 inches). I'm not sure why everyone finds this statue endearing, but they do and he did look cute in his Christmas outfit. In fact, the statue even has an outfit for every season and national holiday.

A nearby mural called Manneken Peace on Rue du Chêne was painted by artist HMI. He is a member of the Brussels CNN group, a famous group of Belgian hip-hop artists for the last 30 years.

MIMA

Located beside the canal in the center of Brussels, housed in the former brewery Belle-Vue, the MIMA or Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art is an interesting visual arts museum. The MIMA presents temporary exhibitions, concerts and performances and has a permanent collection as well covering four different floors. During our visit, the unfinished cellar looked like it belonged in an abandoned building – complete with crumbling walls and barren concrete floors but filled with amazing murals and paste up art. I was very impressed!

In 2016, American artist Maya Hayuk created “City of Lights” – a modern-like chapel with raised ceilings and stained-glass window treatments – a space for reflection.

Rue des Chandeliers Kandelaars

Here we found the walls on this narrow laneway completely covered in interesting street art and paste ups.

Music Murals

You can find life-sized stencils of Bruce Springsteen as well as John Lennon, Jim Morrison, Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix fittingly on the side of a second-hand record shop, The Collector, located at 7 Rue du Chên.

Galerie de Portraits LGBTQ

On a small street near the Mannekin Pis, Rue du Marché au Charbon, I believe, you will find an incredible colorful series of LGBTQ frescoes and several other pieces in Brussel’s gay quarter, which is in the same area.

Space Invaders

In previous blog posts, I’ve mentioned the French street artist known as Invader on our trip to Paris, but I didn’t realize that Brussels is home to about 40 of his mosaic installations. We found a couple of the tiled creations inspired from the 1970s-video game “Space Invaders” in the city center.

Oh, I should also mention that one of the best ways to see more of Brussel’s street art is to hire a Villo! city bike. This gives you a chance to explore Atomium, a bizarre structure made up of nine metal spheres that represent an iron crystal magnified 165 billion times that was built for the first post-WWII world fair in 1958. Definitely worth the trek!

Love the quote in this mural in Brussels!

Have you been to Brussels? Any other travel tips for our next trip?

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Searching for Street Art and Space Invaders in Paris

Paris is known for the Eiffel Tower, its fabulous French food and beautiful buildings. However, did you know that the City of Light is also home to some of the most famed street art artists in the world?

After only knowing about Banksy until we moved abroad in 2010, I didn’t know or pay much attention to street art. Since living in Europe and Melbourne now, I’ve developed a huge appreciation and fascination with street art. In fact, before we travel to a new destination, I look up where the best neighborhoods are to find street art or which street artists to look out for as we walk around.

Last year, I fortunately visited Paris twice – once with a girlfriend and the latter time meeting with a group of friends from Germany. Living in London now makes travel to Paris and elsewhere in Europe so much easier than before! On these trips, I simply focused on food, exploring new neighborhoods and looking for street art. The photos below reflect what I found on these new trips. Enjoy!

Space Invader Street Art

One of the cheekier street artists is known as Invader or Space Invader, a French artist originally based in Paris. He attaches weather-resistant tiles in the form of mosaic images inspired from the 1970s-video game “Space Invaders” in cities around the world. Invader started these installations in Paris in 1998, where you find more than 1,200 of his creations, and has continued to “invade” other cities in France, Europe, the United States, Canada, Asia and Australia.

When visiting Paris, spotting an Invader becomes a sort of game. My friends and I had a blast this past summer looking for and taking photos of the Invaders around Paris.

WRDSMTH in Paris

Labeled as “a writer doing time in LA,” WRDSMTH is another cheeky street artist that is known for his poignant messages flowing from a vintage typewriter or written in a typewriter-type font. The anonymous artist uses a unique combination of stencil/spray painting and wheatpasting for his street art. LA is still home to most of WRDSMITH’s creations, but you’ll find his work in New Orleans, New York, London and Paris.

Earlier in 2016, WRDSMTH’s pithy “The only lie” piece found a new home in Paris! I couldn’t resist taking a photo with this 6-foot version located on Rue de la Lune in Porte Saint Martin.

Making kissy faces with @wrdsmth in #Paris! I told my husband this is sooo true! 😄 #streetartparis #wrdsmthinparis

A photo posted by My Traveling Joys (@mytravelingjoys) on Jul 19, 2016 at 12:16am PDT

Street Art in the 13th Arrondissement

On both trips, I visited a new-to-me neighborhood on the Left Bank – the city’s 13th arrondissement, which has in recent years become a renowned neighborhood for a number of large-scale artworks by both French and international graffiti-street artists.

Unlike other Parisian districts, the 13^th contains many more modern high-rise apartment blocks – which are perfect for large-scale murals. In recent years, the local townhall officials have been working with Galerie Itinerrance and other art groups to commission artists to go ‘big’ on the sides of its buildings. We used the Galerie’s map to try and find as many murals and other street art that we could. Or you could try one of the local street art tours like this one.

Cat by French street artist C215 located at 141 Boulevard Vincent Auriole.

“Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité” by Shepard Fairey at 186 rue Nationale (above the Cat on the Boulevard Vincent Auriole.)Right: “Rise Above Rebel” by American graffiti artist Shepard Fairey (also known as Obey), located at 93 Rue Jeanne d'Arc.

Blue mural by church called “Delicate Balance” by Shepard Fairey at 60 Rue Jeanne d'Arc.

Ecole cité Dorée, corner of Vincent Auriol & rue Jenner.

This one is my favorite!“La Madre Seculaire” by Chilean artist INTI, at 85 Boulevard Vincent Auriole. You also can find INTI’s murals in Łódź, Poland.

Other murals we found in the 13th:

Kraken

Another anonymous street artist is one known for his signed works “Kraken Je t’aime” which feature a legendary but mythical sea monster. We found a few Krakens around the city, but this one is one of my favorites.

When you visit Paris, enjoy the food, but don’t forget to look up and down the side streets for unique street art as well!

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