READING FORWARD. DIALOGHI SULLA BIBLIOTECA

» Wednesday 17 September, 6 p.m.
Sala Michele Ferrero – Casa Betania | via Bersezio 9, Cuneo 

VINCENT ECHES
Director of the Cité internationale de la bande dessinée et de l’image – Angoulême (France)

ROEL VAN DEN SIGTENHORST
General Director of Muntpunt – Brussels (Belgium)

In conversation with

Davide De Luca, Director of Fondazione Artea
Cristina Clerico, Councillor for Culture of the Municipality of Cuneo
Stefania Chiavero, Director of the Civic Library of Cuneo
Oliviero Ponte di Pino, author, lecturer and cultural planner

The event can also be followed via live streaming on Fondazione Artea’s YouTube channel.

The Reading Forward series of meetings continues, promoted by Fondazione Artea as part of the journey towards the new civic library of Cuneo, which from 2026 will be housed in the regenerated spaces of Palazzo Santa Croce, in the heart of the historic centre.

The fourth Reading Forward 2025 event features two leading international guests: Vincent Eches, Director of the Cité internationale de la bande dessinée et de l’image in Angoulême, a unique institution dedicated to the world of comics and drawn images, and Roel van den Sigtenhorst, General Director of Muntpunt Brussels, the main Flemish library in the Belgian capital.

Vincent Eches and the Cité in Angoulême

The Cité internationale de la bande dessinée et de l’image is one of the most important centres in the world dedicated to comics. Nestled along the banks of the Charente River, it is a unique cultural hub in Europe entirely devoted to the ninth art. Created to promote, enhance and preserve comics in all their forms, it is at the same time a specialised library, a museum, a residence for authors, a documentation centre, a media library and an arthouse cinema.

In 2024 it welcomed 250,000 visitors, including 130,000 at the Musée de la Bande Dessinée alone, with record numbers during the Angoulême International Comics Festival, the most important in Europe and among the leading festivals worldwide.

The Cité is organised around three main hubs:

• The Musée de la Bande Dessinée, with over 8,000 original plates that trace the history and techniques of comics from their European origins to Asian and American cultures.
• The Bibliothèque de la Bande Dessinée, open all year round and freely accessible, which holds a collection of more than 56,000 documents including graphic novels, manga, magazines and essays.
• The Maison des Auteurs, an artists’ residence that since 2002 has hosted more than 400 comics creators, illustrators and animators from all over the world.

Since 2019 Angoulême has been recognised as a UNESCO Creative City of Literature, confirming the pioneering role of the Cité in promoting comics as an art form and a contemporary literary language.

Roel van den Sigtenhorst and Muntpunt Brussels

Since September 2023, Roel van den Sigtenhorst has served as General Director of Muntpunt, the main public library in Brussels managed by the Flemish Community, leading an institution that is not only a place for reading but a fully fledged cultural and information centre offering citizens spaces for meeting, learning and exchange. At the same time, as a member of the General Council of Huis van het Nederlands (House of the Dutch Language), he contributes to defining language and cultural policies that highlight the social and inclusive dimension of Muntpunt, strengthening its role as a point of reference for a multicultural and dynamic city like Brussels.

Located on Brussels’ central Place de la Monnaie, Muntpunt was completely renovated in 2013 by the B-architecten studio and today presents itself as a bright, welcoming building with open spaces, meeting rooms, coworking areas and a bar. More than a library, Muntpunt is a place for encounter, exchange and access to information, designed to reduce inequalities and offer all citizens opportunities for knowledge and personal growth.

The library, the result of cooperation between the Flemish Government and the Vlaamse Gemeenschapscommissie (VGC), has become a point of reference for multicultural Brussels, helping to build a more inclusive community through culture and information services.

The dialogue with Eches and van den Sigtenhorst brings to Cuneo two different yet complementary experiences: on the one hand Angoulême, the European capital of comics, and on the other Brussels, an international crossroads and city of multilingualism. Two models which, as in the case of Mechelen, offer valuable insights for reflecting on the future of Palazzo Santa Croce, the former city hospital currently being transformed into a new cultural hub that will house Cuneo’s new civic library from 2026.

READING FORWARD. Dialoghi sulla Biblioteca is a journey accompanying the creation of Cuneo’s new library hub, which in 2026 will find its home in the historic Palazzo Santa Croce. Through a series of talks, it aims to explore and examine the role and identity of libraries, future challenges, and management, enhancement and development processes that can foster cultural growth and social well-being. It is an important opportunity to find inspiration and good practices to draw on, and to rethink how a civic library can be conceived so that it is ever more a space at the service of the city, a welcoming place for books but above all for people, and a cultural and community centre in all its many forms.

READING FORWARD is a project by the Municipality of Cuneo and Fondazione Artea, with the support of Banca di Caraglio, in collaboration with Confindustria Cuneo. Media partner La Stampa