Design Drinks & Talks 18.09

ELDERS offers a platform to both established artists and young makers at the start of their careers. Hippocampus will be their 7th and most ambitious exhibition to date. The show runs from September 13 to November 2, 2025, in a striking former industrial site in Kortrijk.

ELDERS is an interdisciplinary collective that activates unique spaces where contemporary art meets a broad and diverse audience. This happens by integrating the work of national and international artists into unexpected and meaningful contexts, with a special focus on exchange, community building, and dialogue. By using temporary and vacant sites, ELDERS avoids the financial necessity of a permanent structure. At the same time, temporary zones emerge in which experiments take place with presentation formats, audience participation, and collaboration. This leads to exhibitions, film screenings, talks, concerts, architectural interventions, and other forms of artistic exchange.

Aldric d’Oultremont has been active within the Van Marcke Group since 2017. He coordinated the construction and relocation of Van Marcke from the industrial LandMarck site to the new CO²-neutral distribution center and headquarters.
In recent years, he has also led various innovation projects, including Van Marcke Installs, Van Marcke Prefab, and Modulab.

For the past two years, Aldric has been responsible for several operational business units, including the production units and Van Marcke Solutions, which focuses on the future of ecological living through CO²-neutral techniques and solutions.

In his talk, Aldric will reflect on the future of the LandMarck site—a site that is meant to serve as a model for future living, both for the Van Marcke Group and for the wider community.
The seahorse—Hippocampus in Latin—has been the symbol of the Van Marcke Group since 1929 and ties in seamlessly with the exhibition Hippocampus that has recently opened here.

(This talk will be in English)

Emma Cogné is a French artist and designer who focuses on textiles and spatiality. Her work emerges from a process of revaluing and transforming used materials. Together with her, we look ahead to WONDER Creativity Festival! At WONDER, Emma Cogné presents Spell Blanket, a series of textile works that explore the blanket as both a nomadic and narrative object—an intimate shelter that protects, warms, and guides.

The pieces were created in collaboration with the Belgian textile companies: Tessutica, Deltracon, De Poortere Frères, B&T Textilia en Van Neder.
Organized by Fedustria and Designregio Kortrijk and with the support of Aarova and POM West-Vlaanderen.

(This talk will be in English)

Arnaud Eubelen, designer & sculptor, works at the intersection of art and design. He reuses materials from the city, giving them a new life and meaning. For him, the street is a kind of “matériotheque”: a place full of raw materials and stories. By letting go of existing codes and rules, he creates objects that feel familiar yet distinctly his own. In this way, he brings design, art, and industry together in a fresh and original manner.

(This talk will be in English)

Studio Pepijn De Greef is a Ghent-based design studio that creates playful, circular interior objects. Each design is based on recognisable shapes and is made from post-industrial plastic, produced locally in collaboration with social workshops. The studio combines sustainability with colour, tactility and playful shapes. No mass production, but conscious objects with character and a story. The result is accessible design, made to be used and to pause and reflect upon.

Together with Pepijn, we are also looking forward to the WONDER Creativity Festival.

(Talk in het Engels)

Thursday, September 18, reception from 7:00 PM.
The first talk starts at 7:20 PM.
Each speaker will take the floor for about 15 minutes.

Location:
Hal D, LandMarck, Weggevoerdenlaan 5, Kortrijk