BRUGES, BELGIUM.- Bruges embodies culture with Corpus05, through September 11, 2005. Corpus: the first of many cognate meanings of this Latin word is ‘body’. So corporeality is the theme of the cultural festival which the City of Bruges and the vzw Brugge Plus are organizing as the first in a five-yearly series. The subject was prompted by an exhibition of portraits by Hans Memling, which the Bruges museums have been preparing since 2001, as well as projects relating to dance and contemporary art initiated by the Culture Centre. The body is after all a huge source of inspiration for all the arts, as even a quick glance through this programme shows.

The quality of every festival is determined by the programming and the results, and not by the length of the introduction. Yet it is good to list a few of the underlying ideas, so that you know what you can expect and what you can judge us on.

What is important is that we continue to build on the dynamism and now much closer cooperation between Bruges’ cultural institutions (large and small, whatever their discipline). Cooperation as regards programme content and organization is stimulated, not only for the duration of Corpus, but also for the longer term. After all, culture is so much more than one-off festivals, as Bruges is proving.

The blockbusters, such as the ‘traditional’ exhibitions of old Flemish masters, are of course a guaranteed draw, but much attention is also being paid to contemporary art: the history and patrimony of Bruges as the breeding ground for contemporary cultural life, has always been our objective. So in all the art forms, space has rightly been reserved for well-known names, but equally for the intimate, the small-scale and the experimental.

We have defined culture broadly – perhaps to the horror of some. The gastronomic tradition of the Bruges region is reflected in Corpus Degustat (the tasting body), while in the Golden Spurs Marathon the focus is on the sporting body, and the exhibition on ‘wellness’ scrutinizes the culture of physical wellbeing. These are just a few examples from a packed programme.