Touring Belgium

Presenting a wide range of printed media, from travel guides and collected travel letters to albums, picture postcards to bibliographies and war-time propaganda, Touring Belgium studies how in the period from Belgian independence until the wake of World War I, the print culture generated in response to changing forms of travel and tourism was crucial in establishing a national architectural heritage. In richly illustrated essays, eight historians of art and architecture each focus on one main publication, which is discussed in relation to a dazzling background of nineteenth and early twentieth-century cultural discourses, revolutions in image reproduction, and institutional management of heritage. The core publications are partially reproduced as material objects in the book. They bring into view a nascent patrimony that includes gothic town halls and dead cities as well as modern factories and train infrastructure - what threatens or enshrines heritage are often barely distinguishable modern realities. Writers like Karl Schnaase and Victor Hugo, museum conservators like Antoine Schayes and Kervyn de Lettenhove, symbolist painters like Hannotiau and innovative lithographers like Simonau, publishers like Geruzet or the Touring club de Belgique all bring their concerns to bear on what they see as Belgian heritage. Through these preoccupations with patrimony, Belgium is crafted as a nation with a history, and as a European crossroads - historic architecture becomes a reality embedded in its territory as much as it is fabricated in print.