BADAFF
Art & Design Affair, Het Arsenaal Ghent - Belgium
PLUS-ONE Projects collaborates with BADAFF, the Belgian Art & Design Affair in Ghent, as a structurally embedded curatorial and creative partner for the fair. Together with Charlotte Jonckheer and Thomas De Ben, we shape the overall look and feel, scenography and spatial choreography of the event, aligning the industrial venue with BADAFF’s hybrid DNA between art and design.
We curate the participating galleries and design labels, develop a dedicated section for larger, collectible pieces, and design a focused young talents section that highlights emerging practices at the intersection of art, design and making.
This layered curatorial approach ensures that visitors encounter the fair as a coherent narrative rather than a fragmented display of booths.
Branding for BADAFF is developed in collaboration with graphic designers Corbin Mahieu and Victor Verhelst, translating the fair’s experimental, cross‑disciplinary identity into visual communication across print, digital and onsite signage. In this constellation, PLUS-ONE operates as an embedded cultural entrepreneurship hub: a team that moves fluently between exhibition-making, market rethinking and design-driven storytelling, helping BADAFF position collectible art and design as one shared, future-oriented ecosystem.
Team
Organisation: Jan De Geest, Alicia Gonzalez, Harry Vanhoyweghen
Curators: Thomas De Ben, Charlotte Jonckheer
Scenography: Thomas De Ben, Charlotte Jonckheer
Brand identity & Communication: Corbin Mahieu, Victor Verhelst
Website: Mathieu Serruys
Photography & Video: Lars Duchateau
Partners: BNP paribas Fortis Private Banking, VEDETT, Aardig, Wijnen Bruno Desmet-Carlier, STACK by Studio Moto, Stad Gent
Curators
Thomas De Ben
Strategic & Curatorial Partner at PLUS-ONE Projects
+ Art & Design creative at A.P./Studio
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Thomas De Ben (b. 1988) is a Belgian curator and cultural strategist based in Antwerp and Ghent.
With a background in visual arts and a sharp eye for contemporary culture, Thomas navigates the evolving landscape between art, technology, and design. As co-founder of PLUS-ONE Projects and A.P./Studio in Antwerp, he explores new curatorial formats that rethink the conventional gallery model... interdisciplinary, hybrid, and future-facing.
Thomas’ practice is driven by a desire to articulate new frameworks for artistic production and presentation. Rooted in both artistic experimentation and cultural strategy, his approach is content-led and collaborative, always responsive to the urgencies of the time. Rather than reinforcing fixed categories, he seeks out friction zones, spaces where artistic, technological, and cultural languages meet and generate new narratives.
Over the past fifteen years, Thomas has worked with a wide range of national and international artists, institutions, galleries, brands, and cultural clients to develop innovative projects across media and disciplines. His strength lies in shaping meaningful trajectories: from concept development and visual strategy to the creation of platforms that support artistic research and experimentation.
Charlotte Jonckheer
Designer & Artist
+ Co-founder of BRUT Collective
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Charlotte Jonckheer (b. 1988) is a Belgian designer and artist based in Antwerp.
Her practice comprises objects for the interior, design concepts, and material research, resulting in functional and autonomous work with a strong focus on materiality - particularly through the use of paper.
By exploring paper’s lifecycle, she investigates its potential both as physical substance and metaphor. In 2018, she developed her own material - the ‘Chaud Paper Composite’- a combination of paper waste, sourced from a local printshop, and stone dust. This composite became the basis for a range of works created out of an intuitive and iterative research process. Through the reuse of her own material waste, her approach aligns with principles of circularity, underscoring paper’s dual role: as physical substance and indicator of time.
Charlotte’s pieces are made in small editions or as unique works, ranging from self-initiated objects to site-specific commissions. Rooted in a deep appreciation for materiality and craftsmanship, her projects, which bridge various disciplines, are realized in close collaboration with craftsmen, engineers, and manufacturers.
Her work has been exhibited at Palais des Beaux-Arts (Lille), Van Abbemuseum (Eindhoven), and Design Museum Gent, and featured at major design events. She was a finalist for Vitrine pour un designer (2016) and won a Wallpaper* Design Award in 2021. In 2022, she realized a textile and light installation for De Sibbe (an artwork commissioned by Atelier MA+P for Emmaüs).
In 2018, she co-founded BRUT, a collective of Belgian designers that won the Henry van de Velde Gold Award for Young Talent (2019). Together, they exhibited at Bozar Brussels, Kanal Centre Pompidou, Design Museum Gent, and Salone del Mobile.
