The Cobra Depot, a new opportunity to discover Cobra art in Antwerp

Karine Huts-Vandenheuvel takes a seat next to the grand piano Dutch artist Corneille painted in bright colours. She showed our reporter Kristien Bonneure around her brand-new Cobra Depot in a terrace house opposite the headquarters of Katoen Natie, her husband Fernand Huts' company. A new, rough finish two-storey exhibition space designed by Ghent architects De Vylder Vinck Taillieu has been built behind that building.

On the walls, on sliding depot screens, in display and drawer cabinets and also in the setting of a living room, some 270 works are on display: colourful paintings, sculptures, prints, carpets, ceramics, magazines as well as a manuscript by Hugo Claus about painter Karel Appel. All date from the era of the Cobra group and are by artists including Corneille, Constant, Appel, Jorn, Dotremont and Alechinsky.

Over 30 years ago, Karine and Fernand Huts started collecting Cobra art. "Before you start collecting, you have to learn the job," says Karine. "Following auctions, getting to know the artists and the prices. I said to Fred Campo (of the auction house of the same name, ed.) that Alechinsky is so beautiful, but so expensive! He replied: yes, love, but it's worth it!" She did not buy the work on that occasion but there was a sequel. "At some point we were able to buy ten Cobra paintings together and voilà, we were off."

Why is Karine so in love with Cobra art?  "It's something I would call sensual. The beauty of the colours too, although those guys at Cobra were not pursuing beauty. It's childlike, spontaneous, barbaric, pure, free, undisciplined, like a mischievous child, who never quite grew up." And there is a second reason: "In America, there was abstract expressionism with giants like Pollock and Rothko. Cobra was the only European answer to that."

This collection is one of the largest, but until now there was no dedicated Cobra museum in Belgium like there is in the Netherlands. This Cobra Depot shouldn’t really be called a museum. "Unfortunately there are no facilities for less mobile people. It had to remain a house that can be lived in as well as a depot."

What is Cobra?

CoBrA (COpenhagen-BRussels-Amsterdam) was an avant-garde movement active between 1948 and 1951, featuring artists from the Netherlands (Appel, Constant, Corneille), Belgium (Dotremont, Alechinsky) and Denmark (Asger Jorn). They created spontaneous, colourful works, reminiscent of children's drawings or folk art. Apart from visual artists, it also involved writers and poets including Hugo Claus and Lucebert. The group only existed for a few years but had lasting influence.

"The Bird" by Karel Appel is one of Karine’s favourite works. She is also delighted with the rooms, which are like having Cobra art in your own home.  The furniture dates from the same era. A vintage television shows interviews with artists, while jazz resounds. "We want to tell a whole story about the founders and the genesis of Cobra and extend that line to the residence," adds Kristel Dotremont. She is a distant relative of artist Christian Dotremont and served as the producer of the Cobra Depot.

“You are never done with collecting” says Karine Huts-Vandenheuvel. "A collection that stops, dies." The last works were purchased only a few weeks ago. So how does that work? Do the Hutses go to auctions? "We don't go ourselves anymore, people know us too well." Bidding and buying are done over the phone and it is Mr Huts, to whom she has been married for 48 years, who operates the phone. "I get too worked up and then my husband says: I can't buy everything! He’s very good at auctions and I am happy with what comes my way."

Fernand Huts is regularly in the news, after the purchase of the Boerentoren, the famous Twenties Antwerp skyscraper and renovation plans involving architect Daniel Libeskind, or most recently with the purchase of Trinity, a rare skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex.

Karine remains more in the background. But isn't she the driving force? "Cherchez la femme" behind the art collection? "You flatter me, thank you. I'm not going to flatter myself, but I do this with passion. I am retired, but I still have many projects." For many years Karine Huts-Vandenheuvel was a magistrate and then was active at Katoen Natie, her husband’s company in the port of Antwerp-Bruges.

The Phoebus Foundation

The Cobra works are owned by the Phoebus Foundation Fernand and Karine set up. It follows the Anglo-Saxon-style model and is based in Jersey in the Channel Islands.  The foundation is headed by art historian and chief of staff of the Chancellery Katharina Van Cauteren. "We wanted to create a separate patrimony that would not benefit anyone in the family and would exist forever. You know that from time to time my husband thinks of dynasties and eternity," Karine Huts laughs.

The Phoebus Foundation comprises several sub-collections: from antique textiles and Latin American art over old masters, atlases, Reynaert books and Flemish expressionists to Cobra as well as a T-rex skeleton, all high-quality pieces. It is not known exactly how many or what they cost.

The foundation organises its own exhibitions like "Oer", "For God & Money" in Ghent or Flemish Masters in Tallinn, Estonia or Denver and Dallas in the United States, or Jordaens in the Netherlands. Most recently, there was the exhibition on St Dympna in Geel. In addition, the foundation often lends works to museums at home and abroad, such as currently at the Kunstmuseum in The Hague for the "Flemish Expressionists" exhibition. Phoebus has its own restoration studio and publishes books.

"It's a big organisation" says Karine Huts. "Personally I like to keep my projects small. The daily running is done by young people." But ultimately, what is the purpose of that huge art collection and the foundation? "We think we have something valuable and we want people to be part of it. Give them an insight into what we are passionate about and maybe let them experience five minutes of joy."

Private collectors establishing museums: it's of all times. Think of Guggenheim, Getty, Gulbenkian in Lisbon, Ludwig in Cologne, the Bourse de Commerce or the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. This isn’t competition with the government or with official museums, says Karine Huts-Vandenheuvel. "This isn’t something the authorities can do.  By accident, there was a niche, a hole in the market, which we filled for a bit, because there was no Cobra museum. But competing with the government? No way. Besides, the government has no Tyrannosaurus rex," she adds.

The Cobra Depot can be visited by appointment

On the occasion of the opening, the book "Cobra. A Pictorial and Poetic Revolution", compiled by former KMSKA director Paul Huvenne, was published by Hannibal, which is also part of the Katoen Natie group.