Taptoe Feest ©Michiel Devijver
Taptoe Celebrates
Ghent folk hero Walter De Buck created the statue Taptoe Feest in 1993 on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of Theater Taptoe, a legendary theatre that made the Ghent puppet theatre scene famous in Belgium and abroad. TAPTOE’s erf, the organisation which manages the theatre’s heritage, donated the artwork to the city of Ghent.
In 2018, fifty years after the theatre company was founded, the statue was moved to its current location in Zilverhof. The work of art depicts the company’s four pioneers (Luk De Bruyker, Freek Neirynck, Alain Ongenaet and Bart Beys) dancing around Pierke, the hero of the traditional Ghent puppet scene.