Monday, June 27, 2016

Herge Museum

On Saturday Rick and I set out to find the Herge Museum.  This involved a train ride with a change of trains so we were pleased we managed to achieve the return journey without getting lost.

The hallmark of most cities seems to be the universal language of graffiti that lines the railways in every spot available.
Louvain-La-Neuve railway station at the university is an example of celebration of this art form.
From here to the Museum where we learnt more about Georges Herge the man behind the Tin Tin comics which provided so much enjoyment for my sons during their formative years.
There was more to Herge than comic books.  He was absolutely fascinated with cats, particularly Siamese ones.
All in all it was very entertaining working our way through the Museum and gaining insights into the person who created the character of Tin Tin.
Apart from Tin Tin I had not appreciated how much the Belgians and Europeans on the whole love the comic book culture.
We visited a bookstore which was totally dedicated to comic books and not just black and white floppy covered comic books, these are full colour with glossy hardback covers.
Herge apparently lamented the fact that comic books were not always accepted as a proper form of reading and hoped that by the year 2000 it would become more acceptable.

We grew up in an era where comic books were disdained by our school teachers.  Our mother took the point of view that if we were reading comic books it was better than not reading at all so I think she and Herge would have had something in common.

2 comments:

Tired Teacher said...

The local public libraries have sections especially for comic books and graphic novels: the youngsters love them.

margaret said...

what lovely graffiti! Interesting reading about Herge must admit I have never been a fan of comics or cartoon films though as a child did not enjoy reading either