FLACC
WORKPLACE FOR VISUAL ARTISTS
In 2010, Wapke Feenstra will explore the Limburg landscape by following the movements of land-related products.
16 March – Riemst – Potato transport
Farmer Coenegrachts is taking potatoes out of the barn with a telehandler, drives a few meters and then drops the potatoes in the McCain trailer. Driver Gerard Mollet of Trans Pom is keeping an eye on the distribution of the freight. And then off to Harnes in France. After Liège the 26 tonnes of Markies potatoes start into life on the hilly highway. Next across the French border via the A2; the Volvo is filled up straight away. On the display of his mobile Gerard shows a Renault, the truck he usually drives, which is being serviced today. This transport goes as far as the first parking of McCain’s. After two potato transports Gerard disconnects the Volvo and drives home. The trailer now belongs to many men, who weigh, reverse park the trailer and quickly fill a crate with test potatoes. With its sliding system and own transporter this trailer - a bottom dump truck – is steadily dropping the potatoes on the conveyors of the plant. It will take three hours before all Markies have disappeared into the plant.
19 March in the morning – Lommel – at Sibelco's on the sand sucker.
Henri Boonen manages sand suckers mainly on the computer in his office. He calls the man on board, who is also at a PC monitor. Sand sucker De Riebos looks like some lazy grazing creature from a cartoon, but daydreaming is out of the question, because the suction pipe has to be exactly where the right sand is. With an average of 1000 tonnes per hour the pipe has to be moved often. Four pulleys with winches determine the position of De Riebos. It looks like a computer game, but we are moving indeed and bubbles are rising to the surface. The other sucker, De Reiger, has no pulleys, but each time strides on by 3 meters in a straight line. De Reiger takes sand from the banks. This morning Henri gets to the two suckers by shuttle, a.k.a. tank barge, a.k.a. icebreaker. Mooring, sailing and walking on the sea green decks, while the sun is playing with the clouds. Henri has been inspired by his thirty years at Sibelco's. In his spare time he manages, together with his family, the marina Zilvermeer - silver lake. That lake is a former Sibelco quarry and now a nature reserve and recreation area near the neighbouring town of Mol.
19 March in the afternoon – in the Sibelco plant
At a control panel, two men in blue overalls are watching a computer display. In digits and colours information is given on sand being cleared from humus, getting rinsed, washed, vacuum sucked, dried, transported and dumped into the right silo, via the controllable loading point. It is clean quartz sand that is left behind after this journey. On the way only some antifoam agent is added to prevent it from becoming a soap suds festival. At the loading point customers get exactly what they want. After all, ‘I know the wishes of all European glassworks’, says manager Jan Cuyvers. He smiles and, more serious now: ‘A large part of the glass in Europe is made from sand of this plant.’ Specifically, the iron and aluminium oxyde contents vary for every customer and are mixed and loaded to order. When the installation is running, the noise is overpowering. It is easy to see why no visitors’ tours are organised here. A simple emergency stop has been installed for the workers who have to enter the plant every now and then - a long rope you can pull to instantly stop the installations.
24 March – Riemst – potato fields
‘Tomorrow we will be putting in potatoes all day, but today we are preparing the land’, says Chris Coenegrachts on the phone. After the early spring plowing, today the earth is being loosened and leveled with the rolling harrow. A close watch has been kept on the weather these last few days, because too much rain after the tilling is not good. ‘However, there is a thick layer of marl beneath the loam here, and therefore the water balance in this region is actually optimal. The rain can always drain away’.
25 March – Riemst – putting in potatoes
On this sunny spring day it looks as if all Riemst farmers are working their fields. At Chris Coenegrachts's there is also a buzz of activities. His father is dumping the seed potatoes onto the loading platform. The farmer throws powder on the potatoes, to protect them against black scurf. And two hired workers are on the planting machine. Occasionally one jumps on the telehandler to fill up the machine. These are thick seed potatoes and therefore the spacing is set to 40 cm. Every tuber produces approximately 12 potatoes, which will yield 7 to 12 cents per kilo. You can work out yourself how many hectares you need to earn a living. After three hours’ work the machine needs readjusting. Tighten the bolts and check whether everything is still running smoothly. Time for a cigarette break too. ‘This is only the beginning’, according to hired worker David. A great many potatoes will go in during the next few weeks. Up and down the fields, making straight furrows with tonnes of seed potatoes. And after that the weeding starts.
26 March – Sonnisheide – selling lambs
From the stable you can hear the bleating of lambs and sheep, interspersed with the yelps of a young border collie. Confined to his kennel, the collie is unable to welcome the customers, while he is ever so happy with any visitor. Johan Schouteden has a stable full of sucking lambs, this being the ideal Easter lamb. Although they do not celebrate Easter, Muslims like this young lamb too. For precisely now the sucking lamb has tasty and tender meat, having just started to eat solid foot. At Sonnisheide lambs are sold every day now. The lambs are slaughtered under supervision elsewhere. I am having a chat with Salvatore Spina, who will have Easter lamb with his entire family, following the Sardinian tradition. Johan allows him to choose for himself, ‘but do pick a ram though’, he says. This year it is important to keep some ewes, as he wishes to extend his flock. Sonnisheide gets extra heathland for grazing in 2011. Salvatore wants a ram of about 20 kgs. It’s a gamble, but when the ram is weighed it is exactly 20 kgs. This will give you more than 10 kgs, the Sardinian knows from experience.
4 April – Easter Sunday – the lamb
Salvatore Spina turns out to be the son of a Sardinian shepherd. After a disease had struck his flock, his father emigrated to Genk at the age of 32, to work in the Winterslag mine. His family came too. Salvatore was only ten, but he does remember the flock in Sardinia well. Especially his account of the professional slaughter by his father is touching. ‘The legs are cut off last’, he says. Meanwhile this Belgian lamb is prepared in a real wood oven, with oil and some salt, for his relatives. The lamb has to go in the oven at ten for it to be juicy and ready at half past one. More and more Sardinians are coming to see how the Easter lamb is doing and upstairs the table is being set and decorated.
