On Sunday 12 July, Family Day focuses on Nicola L.: When the Earth Turned the Other Way.
Children and their accompanying adults spend the day exploring the exhibition. There are activities for different ages, from a toddler tour and family guided tours to workshops, sewing sessions and ongoing assignments in Het Salon. Waffles will be available at M HKAFE.
Children get free admission. Adults visit the museum at a reduced rate. All activities are free with a valid museum ticket, except for the toddler tour. Advance registration is recommended for the workshops.
Programme
You can move around freely, join a guided tour or register for a workshop. Some activities have limited capacity.
Toddler tour – M HKADEE (2–4 years)
11:15–12:15 | With reservation
In this sensory guided tour, young children and their accompanying adults get to know the exhibition by feeling, looking and listening. You discover how Nicola’s textile artworks are not only meant to be looked at, but above all to be experienced. The tour follows the pace and world of experience of toddlers and offers a first playful introduction to art in the museum.
Family guided tour (6+)
13:30–14:30 and 15:30–16:30 | Without reservation
Travel through the life and work of Nicola L. – from Paris and Ibiza to Brussels and New York. For Nicola, art was part of life: her artworks stood in the living room as if they were furniture, or you could ‘wear’ them and bring them to life through your body.
During this family guided tour, you explore Nicola’s ideas about equality and freedom together with a guide. You also discover her humour and playfulness, and how her textile artworks are not only meant to be looked at, but above all to be experienced. Step into one work together and move as one body with a real ‘shared skin’.
Workshop Atelier Tastbaar (4–9 years)
13:30–14:30 and 15:30–16:30 | Reservation required
Take part as a duo: child with accompanying adult.
Moving together brings people closer. Sounds logical, doesn’t it? Three dancers and musicians welcome you into their studio. They show movements, and how you can weave them together into a tangible moment. Like a warm embrace, connecting you to each other.
t a s t b a a r wants to bring art closer to people, including in places where it does not naturally reach. Dance artist Caroline D’Haese and musician and singer Joey Brocken create tailor-made artistic rituals for many kinds of loneliness. They work with other artists and partners from the care and cultural sectors who inspire them.
Help sew a large quilt (6+)
11:00–12:30 | Reservation required
The session is led by artist Lize Maekelberg. No sewing experience is needed.
The session is intended for children. Parents and accompanying adults can briefly watch at the start and then explore the museum or M HKAFE themselves.
A quilt is a thick, layered blanket sewn by hand from pieces of fabric. No two quilts are the same: every patch, every stitch, every choice of colour and pattern says something about the hands that made it. Quilts have been made in families and communities for centuries: as gifts, as memories, as acts of togetherness.
During this session, you sew a patch for a large collective quilt. We use weeds as the motif: wild plants that grow where they are not expected, outside the categories people have created for them. Just as people do not always fit into the boxes made for them. You can also add a written message with your piece of fabric. Every piece of fabric will really become part of it, and afterwards the quilt will travel on.
A collaboration with Antwerp Queer Arts Festival. The quilt is part of WOEKER, a festival on gender diversity taking place in November 2026 in Antwerp, Ghent and Leuven.
Het Salon
11:00–17:00 | Open throughout the day
Move together in a raincoat for four people in the spirit of Nicola L. Make a collage starting from the silhouette of your own face. Or draw inspiration from philosophical questions. Het Salon is the place in the museum where you can freely investigate, feel and imagine.
https://www.muhka.be/en/activities/family-day/
Sunday 12 July
11:00–17:00
M HKA, Leuvenstraat 32, 2000 Antwerpen
For whom: families, children and accompanying adults. Age varies by activity.
Admission: children get free admission. Adults visit at a reduced rate. All activities are free with a valid museum ticket, except for the toddler tour.
Reservation: reservation is required for the toddler tour. Reservation is required for Atelier Tastbaar and Help sew a large quilt. The family guided tours are without reservation.
