Summer expo Imagination Bound : meet the curator

Interview with Katja Clement

Book art has been taught at the Academy of Berchem for a hundred years. This anniversary is celebrated with the exposition ‘Bound by Imagination’ in the Nottebohm room of the Heritage Library Hendrik Conscience and other locations in Antwerp. But what exactly is book art? And how has this discipline developed itself? We turned to Katja Clement for answers since she has been active for 25 years as a maker and instructor of book art and as the curator of the expo. Moreover, she is the fifth woman in a row to head the programme.

Priorities

The Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library is the reference library for anyone interested in finding out more about Antwerp, Dutch literature or the Flemish cultural heritage.

Antwerp

The Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library collects all publications about the city of Antwerp and its history.

Oscar Nottebohm

The Nottebohm Room in the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library is named after the Antwerp patron Oscar Nottebohm (1865-1935). This particular descendant of the Nottebohm family was a grandson of Diederich Wilhelm Nottebohm who moved to Antwerp from Bielefeld in 1811.

Porn, pulp & literature

Online exhibit

In December 2019, the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library presented an unknown and long-hidden part of Flemish literature and cultural history: pornographic literature with the exhibition "Porn, pulp & literature". View the online exhibition here.

Podcasts Miraeus Lectures

Together with the Flanders Book Historical Society and the Antwerp Bibliophile Society, the Hendrik Conscience Heritage Library organizes book-historical lectures that place book history in the Netherlands in an international perspective. Browse our archive of a few past lectures and listen to the podcasts.

Practical information

Do you intend to visit our library to consult a publication or visit our stunning Nottebohm Room? Below you can find all the practical information you need, from the opening hours to information for wheelchair users and accessibility.

Dutch literature

From literary debut to collected edition: the works of Flemish and Dutch authors past and present are brought together here.

Cultural and general history

The Heritage Library collects publications on general history and on the history of art and culture in Flanders and the Low Countries.

The Library