Il Truc-Troc, 1975: una prima mondiale

On 14 June 1975, Château Malou in Woluwe-Saint-Lambert hosted the first Truc-Troc, an artistic concept imagined by two artists: Charline Mahy and Mon De Rijck. The principle: barter an original artwork for an object or a service - a holiday, a camera, a television, an oriental rug, records... Anything could be accepted, except money.

The operation was organised by the Galerie de Prêts d'œuvres d'art, founded at Château Malou in 1972, which then held some nine hundred works by nearly three hundred artists. Around two hundred artists took part in this first edition, described by the press as a "world first", and it closed with an artists' ball.

From the opening night onwards, the magazine Spécial recounts, the behaviour of art lovers changed: everyone examined the works attentively, wondering what to offer the artist to "make them favour me". After three weeks, every artist without exception had received barter offers.

Fonti: Spécial n° 545 (10 septembre 1975) · Claude Muyls (1975)