About Jester

Mission

Jester (nl: jester) is a meeting place for the development and presentation of contemporary art where the jesters of the future live, work and share in Genk. The cross-pollination between residencies and exhibitions makes Jester a fertile soil for experimentation, research and exchange in a post-industrial landscape. The jester is an interlocutor who offers no unequivocal answers, but enters into dialogue with outspoken and less heard voices. Jester listens attentively to artists and curators, thinkers and makers, neighbors and partners, to present society with a multi-voiced but critical mirror. These unexpected encounters between artists and the community, are at the basis of our generous and inclusive operation, where everyone is heard and questioned.

Jester was created in 2021 through the merger of FLACC and CIAP, two Limburg organizations that have grown into vital players in the (inter)national arts field since the 1970s. In 2023, Jester landed in three new pavilions on the C-mine site. Because of the unique history of this mining site - and its neighboring, multicultural cités -  social, economic, demographic and environmental issues are deeply rooted in Jester's operation. Winterslag's landscape embodies its ability to generate and process energy, through its industrial past of coal mining, but also through its current concentration of cultural actors and its central location in the Euroregion. Jester establishes new connections from the periphery to this resilient ecosystem to (re)generate new energy in this thriving residency and exhibition space.

Jester supports emerging and international artists to expand their practice and experiment with new media in our workshops (wood, metal, ceramics and digital). Through artistic, productional and business guidance, Jester encourages these future jesters to question themselves and the world. The different temporalities of development and presentation are inextricably intertwined and meet in an inspiring conversation between different artistic practices. The site around Jester is a developing area, which resonates with a dynamic and transformative program structure where artists help shape the young organization and its evolving physical and mental space. Just as Genk was known at the beginning of the 20th century as a station d'artistes - a beloved haven for painters, scientists and writers - Jester annually welcomes dozens of international artists to meet and explore the scarred, post-industrial landscape together.

Jester subscribes to the principles of care, diversity and sustainability. Jester works with artists according to the values of Juist is Juist and provides fair rewards for artistic work. Jester recovers, recycles and borrows materials to combat overproduction and waste in the arts sector. For artist selection criteria, Jester does not discriminate between gender, religion, background, nationality or age. In these and many other ways, the art organization tries to contribute to a more inclusive, transparent and inclusive sector and world. 

In an interview, Beatrice K. Otto, author of "Fools Are Everywhere: The Court Jester Around the World," put it as follows:

"I think we will always need jesters or jester types, because there will always be much to mock or revile - until we either lose our ability to laugh or the world miraculously becomes devoid of stupidity, dullness and corruption. If we look at what has happened so far, the human race will have to go extinct before that happens, so I don't see jesters going extinct anytime soon, and it will be a sad and dangerous day if they do. Even in democratic societies they play an important role, since they are far from perfect. And in totalitarian states, I have the impression that jester humor is quite difficult to suppress because it is part of the survival mechanism - it just goes underground and takes on a sharper edge.

So all in all, the jester is not just a historical curiosity, but a dynamic element of human society."