Asterix, Tintin and a trip to Brussels

For the love of Euro comics

This weekend is the yearly Brussels Comic Strip Festival, where comics creators, fans and publishers come to the city to celebrate the Ninth Art. It’s a festival I’ve long wanted to go to, and still need to get to (hopefully next year). But I did have the chance to go to Brussels - the Comics Capital of Europe - in January this year. It was fantastic, and I thought now’s a good time to share about it. I’m a huge fan of French and Belgian comics, they’ve shaped my work immensely, and I wish more people knew about them.

Asterix and Tintin are just the beginning

If you’re in Britain chances are you’ve heard of Asterix, Tintin or the Smurfs: typically the books are 40 pages or so of glorious, rich illustrations at A4 size; funny, all-ages, thrilling, wryly observant, expressively drawn, witty and sophisticated with wonderful characters and bursting with ideas and adventure. Crisp, top-class visual storytelling, a fusion of words and image working together to deliver a hefty dose of imagination and wonder. But these are just the tip of the iceberg…

The trip

For years I’d wanted to go to Brussels to see the amazing Comic Art Museum - a centre to celebrate all things Euro comics (or bande dessinée, BD) . Typically, the pandemic had made it hard to go, but once that was out of the way, a friend of mine visited and sent me a photo from inside the Museum. I knew I had to find a way to get there. Late last year, having had several major life events in the space of a few years, I wanted to make the trip finally happen - a good thing to look forward to for a new chapter of life.

I asked my Father-in-Law if he wanted to go, he said yes, so we booked a Eurostar deal for tickets and hotel rooms, and the trip was on. He’s a Tintin fan, and I’m an Asterix fan, so that lends itself to some mutual mockery.

A birthday card I drew for my Father-in-Law after he sent me a birthday card of Tintin having a dig at Asterix

Very early on a cold January day, we arrived at St Pancras station in London, and boarded the Eurostar to Brussels. A couple of hours later, we’d arrived and made our way through icy streets at barely 0 degrees C. On the way to the hotel, we passed one of the murals on the city’s Comic Strip Trail. There’s over 80 in all!

One of the murals on the Comic Strip Trail - this guy’s the Scorpion

Yes, there’s a walk around the city with beloved characters painted on the side of buildings, in some cases as if they’re interacting with their environment. It was a taste of things to come. I’d like to go back and walk the trail another day.

We found the hotel near to the Museum, checked in and made our way over.

On the way to the Comic Art Museum

The Comic Art Museum

We found the Museum, a glorious Art Deco building, and entered.

Inside the Comic Art Museum - Art Deco glass ceilings, ornate lamppost, a comic shop and a Smurf. It doesn’t get much better than this

If you like Tintin, you know you’re in the right place

This place is amazing. After buying tickets, we started looking around the first exhibition…

Firstly, a history of the comic strip; stretching way back to the visual wordsmithery of the ancient Egyptians. I was surprised to see read just how many comic albums are released in the French market every year, and lovely to see that the art form is taught in art schools (this certainly wasn't the case in Britain when I was weighing my options after school - clearly I should have moved to France!)

Some exhibition panels (Source: The Comic Art Museum)

This section really grabbed my interest: early Christian monks developed the visual language of comic art to tell Biblical stories, a visual vocabulary which we still use today.

I never knew this… (Source: The Comic Art Museum)

Early monastic comic art portraying Biblical accounts (Source: The Comic Art Museum)

Then there was an exhibit showcasing the different themes and genres of stories in modern day comic art, with some lovely original panels of art to pore over. It’s so good to be able to see the original ink brush strokes and the corrections made by the artist, get a glimpse of the creative process - it’s reassuring in a world of InstaFaceGramTube filters and automated digitally generated imagery to see the hand of the artist in the work, the handmade care, decision making, intention and craft of years of finely honed skill present there.

Original pages of art from the strips Chlorophylle, a dormouse (top row); Dad (bottom left); Brindille (bottom right) (Source: The Comic Art Museum)

After that amazing walk through genres and styles (from the more grounded in reality, adult works to fantastical to family friendly), we bumped into some familiar friends…

Tintin, Snowy, Captain Haddock and Professor Calculus - great to see them in real life :) (Source: The Comic Art Museum)

We’d already seen so much amazing art, but that wasn’t even the half of it. The very top floors beckoned…

To be continued…