Magazine issue twelve

We’re ready! For an artistic autumn. An autumn in which blue sets the tone.

Blue: the colour of our partner KU Leuven, which is celebrating its 600th anniversary. Together, we’re building bridges between art and science.

Blue is also the colour of this cover, of the magazine’s inside pages, and of one of our exhibition rooms: the deep, mythical blue of lapis lazuli.

This precious stone takes centre stage in the fourth room of Alicja Kwade’s solo exhibition. It features an impressive block of lapis lazuli weighing more than two tonnes, surrounded by walls painted ultramarine. For Kwade, the stone is a time capsule, carrying us back to geological eras before humans existed. At the same time, the work raises questions about how we assign value to materials: because of the labour-intensive process and scarce yield, the pigment ultramarine, extracted from lapis lazuli, was as valuable as gold during the Renaissance.

And with that, the exhibition opens a window onto larger questions. Is something valuable only when you assign it meaning? Does a stone weigh the same for everyone, everywhere? Is the world what it is, or what you think it is?

Be amazed. See you soon at M?