Open Guest Lecture on Human Rights

How are human rights and popular culture interrelated? Can we use fundamental rights to preserve popular cultural traditions or are they rather arguments that can impose change? How should we deal with older works of art, made in different era’s, with different sensitivities? Is that a matter of for human rights and if so, how will they operate? These, and other related questions will be addressed in a lecture on the crossroads of culture and human rights.

Koen Lemmens studied law at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. In 2003, he obtained his PhD at the European University Institute (Florence,Italy). Currently, Koen Lemmens is a professor of human rights law at KU Leuven. He is also teaching in the E.Ma-programme in Venice (Global Campus), Italy.

He is an attorney at the Brussels bar, specialized in proceedings before the European Court of Human Rights. At present he is the Vice-President of the Belgian Federal Human Rights Institute.