KJERSTI G.ANDVIG, JURGEN OTS, MICHAEL VAN DEN ABEELE, PIA POLESE, JEAN-SAMUEL N'SENGI
MANNEKEN PIS
BRUSSELS, JUNE THE 15th
The invitation read "13H SHARP".
At 12.50pm, the tourists massed in front of the Manneken Pis were startled by a megaphone voice issuing a "restraining order". The order was immediately followed by a modest procession of five people, mostly in civilian clothes, carrying blue inflatable beach mattresses. Anxious to be punctual, the group moved to a more favourable position, biding their time. One of its members was drinking a beer. Everyone was greeting acquaintances and friends.
Finally, here they were again, breaking through the crowd and setting up the inflatable mattresses vertically against the fence protecting/enclosing the Manneken Pis. All the mattresses fell off in the first few seconds. A man picked up one of them and tried to hold it upright. The person with the megaphone, dressed in a sort of transparent dress revealing black knickers and bra and a number of tattoos, began to read out a text, perched on two blue, consigned vegetable crates.
The text was essentially inaudible apart from "restraining order" and "fucking (...)". It was read from a set of laminated sheets joined by rings. Was it really read? One doubts it, the thread was somewhat loose. The sheets visible to the public were made up of images of lace and men lined up, half-naked. Potentially under showers. Once the text was finished, the pages were turned in silence, without any definite end in sight. It was the most awkward moment and the most successful.
The rhythm of the execution was chaotic, the smile on the presiding officer's face imprecise (malice?). What was perhaps most surprising was the total acceptance of the crowd of tourists. The telephones pointed their lenses from the Manneken Pis towards the restrictive speaker without hesitation. A strange paradox. Once the order had been given, everyone naturally returned to the first object of their curiosity: Manneken Pis. The whole thing lasted five minutes, and one fact remains unexplained. Was the restraining order aimed at the tourists, a horde of would-be paedophiles, or at the Manneken Pis himself, a prepubescent exhibitionist?
Having arrived very early, I was able to overhear what a tour guide was saying to the motley crew in his charge. He compared the disappointment of seeing the Manneken Pis for the first time to that of seeing the Mona Lisa. At the risk of misinterpreting his words, perhaps we should take up the Swiss expression that one can be disappointed for the good.
This essentially unintelligible legal performance was a Jura-style disappointment, with a Helvetian slant.