HISTORY

"The democratic patronage"

In 1971, a few young artists had decided to gather and defend different principles : the first one: help themselves and each other. The second one: give the general public the opportunity to discover them as artists, and make the public familiar with contemporary art through themselves.

The young sculptor Mon De Rijk (Ninove 1943) created the democratic patronage. Within this concept he organised free exhibitions for the artists and provided the opportunity for the individual to rent one or more pieces of art.

In 1972, the Cultural Council of Woluwe St Lambert cooperated with this organization. Together they created in the Castle Malou the first art gallery, where you could borrow art pieces. More than two hundred artists participated in several activities including "Truc Troc".

Mon de Rijck and Charline Mahy inaugurated the first Truc Troc in 1975 in the Castle Malou. This was without any doubt an unforgettable experience of the artistic season of 1975 in Brussels. 200 artists participated in the first "Truc Troc".

Because of the great success of 1975, the GPOA TRUC TROC decided to continue the organisation of Truc Troc in October 1976. Again 70 pieces of art were traded.

Almost thirty years later, in 2004, over a hundred contemporary artists gathered again for this happening in the "Palais des Beaux Arts". Some of them were already present at one of the first editions. It became a great success with more than 4.000 participants.

In 2005 Truc Troc knew an incredible success: not less than 8.000 visitors showed up for this artistic, musical and festive manifestation on the 19th and 20th of November.

2006 : This last edition was tremendously successful ! More than 8.000 have shown their enthousiasm. A large amount of artists, seduced by the concept, were standing at Wolu-Culture Center front doors, to take an opportunity to expose their work at the next TRUC TROC.

For the 4th edition in 2008, Truc Troc beats all the records. More than 10 000 visitors enjoyed the gig in one single weekend.
The artists as well as the visitors were both very surprised by each other.
All these signs indicated that something big was going to happen for the next edition in 2009.

2009 : the 5th edition has been outstanding. More than 20.000 people came to discover more than 200 artists exposing over 300 artworks during the last w-e of January in the marvelous environment of the Grand Circuit of the Bozar in Brussels. What can we expect more for the 6th edition?