Mortimer and paper Japan" exhibition

Original art, tracing paper, preparatory sketches, unpublished archival material, and Japanese prints come together around a shared medium: paper, the material common to both comics and printmaking. Set in 1970s Japan, the plot of *Professor Satō’s 3 Formulas* features Philip Mortimer at the center of an adventure blending espionage, robotics, and scientific innovations. Fascinated by Japan despite never having visited it, Edgar P. Jacobs drew on exceptional research to recreate landscapes, architecture, everyday objects, and traditions with remarkable precision. His perspective explores both the reality and the imagination of a country where technological modernity and cultural heritage coexist harmoniously. The exhibition offers a behind-the-scenes look at this creative process. Visitors discover Jacobs’ meticulous working method, his attention to detail, the importance of his documentary research, and the various stages involved in creating a comic strip page. Alongside the comics, a selection of Japanese prints, artworks, and objects highlights the visual parallels between the artist’s work and that of the great masters of printmaking: composition, the interplay of light and shadow, theatricality, color, and narrative. Throughout the exhibition, Jacobs’ fascination with Japan is also revealed through the numerous documents he has collected over the years, as well as the objects that fueled his imagination. The exhibition demonstrates how this collection helped shape a body of work in which science fiction engages with Japanese traditions, navigating the realms of spirituality, innovation, and the quest for humanity. Presented in two successive rotations to preserve the most fragile works, the exhibition will refresh part of its display starting November 3, 2026, offering a new selection of originals to discover. Bringing together nearly 160 original works, previously unseen archives from the Edgar P. Jacobs Foundation, prints from the museum’s collections, and a spectacular samurai robot designed specifically for the occasion, *Mortimer and the Japan of Paper* offers a unique immersion into the world of the master of the “clear line” style and into the Japan that fueled his imagination. Exhibition curators: Thierry Bellefroid & Éric Dubois.