What's on this week: 30 June-6 July

As part of Mixity 2017, Brussels' year-long celebration of diversity, Mixity 183 is a pop-up museum built into a container, an ephemeral cultural venue that will travel around Brussels from July to October. First stop from 4-16 July is at the newly opened Brass'Art Digitaal Café on Molenbeek's Place Communale. The museum is a meeting place, a photo exhibition and an augmented reality experience, a way to give a glimpse of the plethora of community groups in Brussels, home to 183 nationalities, and express the city's pride in its diversity: cultural, linguistic, sexual, generational, social, and more. Inside the container, visitors will discover a photo gallery (by photographer Olivier Cornil), which presents Brussels' diversity from a subjective and human-scale point of view. Starting from these photos, visitors can then use the tablet provided (or an app downloaded to their mobiles) to enjoy an immersive augmented reality experience, with “air drawings”, 3D graphical creations by illustrator and artist Pauline de Chalendar and a soundtrack by musician Daniel Offerman (Girls in Hawaii, Hallo Kosmo, TRESOR). Next stops: the Royal Park, Place Sainte-Croix (Flagey) and then Place du Luxembourg.

This year is the 50th anniversary of the death of René Magritte and the milestone is being observed across Belgium. In Knokke there are three different Magritte experiences. First of all, there is an outdoor exhibition on the boardwalk and the beach across from the casino during which the visitor enters an enormous bowler hat, dons virtual reality glasses and enters the paintings of the Surrealism master. Afterwards the visitor can pose next to a giant pipe while children enjoy a Magritte play area. Secondly, Magritte's largest painting, The Enchanted Kingdom, is located in the casino and will be exceptionally accessible to visitors during the summer. The painting is 300m² and will be enhanced with a 15-minute sound and light show. Finally, there is a Magritte stroll throughout Knokke that can be downloaded on your phone.
30 June-3 September, around Knokke

In conjunction with its massive Yo Brussels Hip-Hop Generations exhibition, Bozar is partnering with youth clubs, neighbourhood centres and the Centre Bruxellois d'Action Interculturelle to offer summer courses across Brussels. This week Alerte Urbaine is offering a human beatbox class (making music with one's mouth and a microphone) for those aged 14 to 21. Other programmes in other areas of the city this week are breakdance (13-16 years), rap/slam (14-20 and 18-25 years) and graffiti (14-20). Workshops are free or a nominal entrance fee. Registration required. There will be different courses available each week through August.

For a gourmet treat, head to Namur this weekend for the first-ever W food festival. Staged by Wallonia’s gastronomic chef collective Generation W, it’s a unique opportunity to taste dishes by some of the region’s top chefs. They are joined by artisan food producers and guest chefs from abroad. If sampling Michelin-star food wasn’t enough of a draw, the festival’s theme is beer, showcasing artisan brewers such as Bertinchamps. Diverse activities programmed, including evening concerts and workshops for kids. Open to the general public Saturday and Sunday, professionals on Monday.
1-3 July, Namur citadel, €8 entry

The new show at the Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art (MIMA) housed in the old Bellevue Brewery building along the canal is entitled Art is Comic and offers the opportunity for some of the most inventive current comic book artists to show us the breadth of their work. Pushing the limits of the genre is a common denominator between the seven artists in the show - four Belgians, a Dane, a Frenchman and a Spaniard - exemplified for instance by Brecht Vandenbroucke who mixes pop culture and classical painting.
Until 31 December, MIMA, Brussels

The first week of July means that it's time for the Ommegang, an annual recreation of the presentation of his son Philip to the people of Brussels by the Emperor Charles V in 1549, which as usual will involve 1,400 participants including 180 members of the Belgian aristocracy representing their ancestors who were there in 1549. Not to mention 1,800 costumes, 47 folkloric groups, 300 flags, five marching bands, 48 horses, eight giants including the Dragon of Saint George which weighs 120kg, measures 4.25 by 2.3m and is carried by just one person, 90 days of preparation and 2km of itinerary. And, as usual everything will be commented in Dutch, French and English on the Grand-Place. What's different this year is that the Ommegang will be performed on Wednesday and Friday instead of the usual Tuesday and Thursday and that the activities in the Royal Park will take place on four days: Wednesday until Saturday. The park activities will include jousting, a renaissance village and market, the Kiwanis stand which this year will be collecting funds for Haitian orphans, and The Royal Break which is a temporary terrace and café in the park. Also new this year is a vintage vehicle rally organised by British Oldtimers Belgian Club. The archery contests at the Sablon, and a renaissance market behind the Bourse complete the venues. The Royal Park, Sablon activities and parade through the streets are free. Seats on the Grand-Place €47,50 to €77,50 (one side of the square is free but standing only and fills up early).
5-8 July, across Brussels

The Festival des Midis-Minimes and De Zomer van Sint Pieter will present 40 midday concerts in Brussels and 30 in Leuven. The formula is simple: weekday high-quality short concerts at extremely affordable prices. The opening concert will feature the music of tango master Astor Piazzolla. The concerts follow weekly cycles: Mondays will be Flamenco and the music and dances of Togo, Tuesday will be devoted to early European music, Wednesdays will bring us 18th-century music, Thursdays 19th-century music and Fridays 20th and 21st-century sounds.
3 July-30 August, Royal Conservatory of Music, Brussels and in Leuven

On the first four Sundays in July, free concerts (mostly jazz with a little blues and Brazilian sounds) will be held at the lovely bandstand in the Royal Park. The Royal Park Music Festival has been taking place for 27 years and this year the musicians are from Belgium, Brazil, Estonia, France and the UK. The perfect concert series for a laid-back Sunday.
Sundays in July, 11.00 and 15.00, Royal Park, Brussels

After close to 30 years in urban settings, Couleur Café has given itself a brand new location, the Osseghem Woods at the foot of the Atomium. The festival is taking full advantage of the beech forest setting with its natural amphitheatre, glens and meadows - there will be hidden away "chill zones" with hammocks and a secret bar that festival-goers will have to find. Four colour-coded stages will welcome a wide array of top world music talent and 40 different restaurants will be serving food here, there and everywhere among the trees. Read more about this year's festival here...
30 June-2 July, Osseghem Park, Brussels

It's a sad day in the history of quirky live cabaret theatre and spectacle in Brussels with the upcoming closing after 32 years of La Samaritaine in the Marolles. But if you've never had the opportunity to experience the unique location and atmosphere you have a final chance with a five-day run by Brussels singing group TIBIDI appearing nightly at 20.30. This trio of bruxelloises reinterprets, a cappella and more precisely with close voicing, classical repertoire, French standards and international pop hits.
27 June-1 July, La Samaritaine, Brussels

Midsummer Mozartiade, the music festival that celebrates Mozart and the Brussels 18th-century locations that he frequented during his stay, is back for its second edition. Last year it concentrated on Le Nozze di Figaro and took place in and around the Royal Park. This year it's centred on Don Giovanni and is located on the Place des Martyrs. Performances will take place in the Théâtre des Martyrs but there will also be daily free family-friendly concerts outdoors on the square. As well as performances of Don Giovanni there will be "a voyage in four different concerts across the Mozartian universe". Additionally there will be a series of free lectures in the Quartiers Latins bookstore.
2-9 July, Brussels

Three days, 50 concerts, seven venues and 300 artists… this year's Musiq3 festival - "the most rocking of all classic music festivals" - is called Touch and is dedicated to piano music. Bartok, Mozart, Brahms, Bach and a celebration of the 450th anniversary of Monteverdi's birth will get things going. Members of the new international keyboard elite (most of them less than 30 years old), many appearing in Brussels for the first time, will play piano, accordion and bandoneon. New venues such as the church of the Cambre Abbey will add heft to the festivities. The big top at Flagey will be a gathering place with food and drink and will provide for free an eclectic mix of jazz, choral singing and world music as well as a swinging opening night with a lindy hop demonstration to the sounds of Reverend Juke. Professionals and amateurs will take to the floor and cut a rug.
30 June-2 July, Flagey, Brussels

Brussels’ film museum Cinematek presents a summer-long programme of concert films, rock operas and music documentaries created by some of the genre’s biggest directors. It opens appropriately enough with a film about the quintessential summer music festival, namely Michael Wadleigh’s iconic 1970 documentary Woodstock. Nearly 30 films more are on the programme, including DA Pennebaker’s mythic Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Wim Wenders’ Buena Vista Social Club and Jonathan Demme’s Stop Making Sense.
2 July-30 August, Cinematek, Brussels

Asterix in Belgium is an interactive exhibition based on the well-loved comic strip invites youngsters to learn about history and culture.
Until 3 September, Belgian Comics Art Museum, Rue des Sables 20, Brussels