Weaving Worlds: How Beaufort Transformed a Coastline from Tourist Strip to Artistic Canvas

On a blustery March morning in 2003, a peculiar scene unfolded on the normally tranquil Belgian shoreline. A giant bronze turtle appeared on the beach at Nieuwpoort, while further along the coast in Ostend, a massive steel structure that resembled nothing so much as an alien landing craft took shape against the horizon. These were not movie props or elaborate pranks, but the first installations of what would become one of Europe's most distinctive art events: the Beaufort Triennial.

The Belgian coast—a 67-kilometer stretch of wide sandy beaches punctuated by resort towns and bordered by the churning North Sea—had long been known primarily as a holiday destination. With its Belle Époque architecture, bustling seafood restaurants, and nostalgic seaside attractions, it offered a pleasant if predictable vacation experience. Few would have imagined that this conventional tourist strip would become an internationally recognized venue for contemporary art.

"It was a completely absurd idea at the time," recalls Philip Vandenbossche, one of the event's original organizers. "We were proposing to place challenging contemporary art along a coastline known primarily for its waffles and ice cream parlors. Many thought we'd lost our minds." But what the skeptics didn't appreciate was how the inherent tension between these contradictory worlds—high art and popular tourism, intellectual engagement and leisurely escape—would create something unique.

The first edition, known simply as "Beaufort01," featured 30 temporary installations by Belgian artists including Jan Fabre, Panamarenko, and Wim Delvoye. Despite limited funding and considerable logistical challenges—from securing permits to ensuring artworks could withstand the notoriously fickle North Sea weather—the exhibition attracted nearly 300,000 visitors. Perhaps more significantly, it created spontaneous moments of encounter between art and audience that would have been impossible within gallery walls.

"I watched an elderly couple stare at Jean-Michel Folon's sculpture 'Walking to the Sea' for nearly half an hour," says cultural journalist Liesbeth Decan, who covered the inaugural edition. "They were completely transfixed, having stumbled upon it during their usual morning walk. These weren't people who regularly visited galleries or museums. The art had come to them, in a place where they felt comfortable, and something magical happened in that exchange."

This democratization of the art experience—removing the institutional barriers that often intimidate casual viewers—became a defining characteristic of Beaufort. But the triennial's relationship with its coastal setting evolved significantly over the years. While early editions often treated the coastline primarily as a backdrop for displaying art, later iterations developed more substantive engagements with the ecological, historical, and social complexities of the maritime environment.

The 2015 edition marked a particularly significant turning point with its "Beyond Borders" theme. Curated by a team including Lorenzo Benedetti and Hilde Teerlinck, it explicitly addressed the sea as a political space—a boundary that both connects and divides, a site of commerce and migration, leisure and tragedy. This conceptual shift coincided with Europe's refugee crisis, giving added poignancy to works that considered the sea as a fraught crossing point rather than merely a scenic vista.

The coastal municipalities' relationship with the triennial has also transformed over time. Initially, some local authorities viewed the event with suspicion, concerned it might disrupt tourism or prove controversial. "In the beginning, we had to explain why putting a giant mussel sculpture on the beach wasn't just a waste of money," laughs Vandenbossche. But as the economic and cultural benefits became apparent—Beaufort now draws over 450,000 visitors per edition—resistance gave way to enthusiasm.

This enthusiasm manifested most tangibly in the development of the Beaufort Sculpture Park. Beginning in 2009, municipalities began purchasing selected works from each edition, creating a permanent collection that now comprises over 40 sculptures distributed along the coastline. This growing outdoor museum not only provides cultural continuity between triennial editions but has fundamentally altered the coastal landscape, inserting moments of artistic reflection into everyday environments.

The current edition, Beaufort24, continues this evolution under the curatorial direction of Els Wuyts. Themed "Fabric of Life," it emphasizes deeper connections with specific locations, moving slightly inland along the coastal tram route to explore the relationships between port zones, village centers, markets, and landscapes. The 18 new commissions by artists including Johan Creten, Lucy and Jorge Orta, and Richard Deacon respond to local histories and geographies while addressing universal themes.

"What distinguishes Beaufort from other biennials or triennials is this profound integration with place," explains Wuyts. "We're not creating a temporary exhibition that could happen anywhere. These works emerge from and speak to this specific coastline, with its particular historical layers, its environmental challenges, its social dynamics. The sea isn't just a pretty backdrop—it's a protagonist in a complex narrative."

This site-responsive approach is exemplified by works like Filip Vervaet's "Staging Sea" in De Panne—a fountain installation set within a reconstructed dune landscape that references both the coastal ecosystem and a 1958 painting by surrealist Paul Delvaux. Similarly, Johan Creten's monumental bronze sculpture "The Herring" in Koksijde speaks to the fishing heritage of the region while serving as a contemporary monument to maritime culture.

Beyond their artistic merits, these installations serve a broader cultural purpose. In a region where tourism often emphasizes consumption and leisure, Beaufort offers a different model of engagement with place—one that encourages reflection, connection, and a deeper appreciation of coastal environments increasingly threatened by climate change and development pressures.

"Twenty years ago, we couldn't have imagined how this 'absurd idea' would transform the Belgian coast," reflects Vandenbossche. "What began as an audacious art project has become part of the region's identity. Visitors now come specifically to experience this dialogue between art, sea, and landscape. And locals have developed a new relationship with their own environment, seeing familiar places through fresh eyes."

As climate change reshapes coastlines worldwide and tourism struggles to reinvent itself in more sustainable forms, Beaufort offers a compelling case study in how cultural initiatives can redirect our engagement with sensitive environments. By weaving art into the fabric of coastal life, it has created a unique model of place-making—one that respects history while imagining new futures, that celebrates beauty while confronting urgent challenges.

From those first improbable installations on windswept beaches, Beaufort has evolved into something more profound than an art exhibition. It has become a lens through which we might reconsider our relationship with maritime spaces, a thread connecting past and future along a shoreline in constant flux. As the North Sea continues its eternal rhythm against the Belgian coast, these artistic interventions invite us to listen more carefully to what the tides might tell us.