Since June 2019 Private Foundation Stichting Stiftung Chopin
The Chopin Foundation, a non-profit organisation was created in 1999 under the leadership of H.E. Mr. Jan Wojciech Piekarski who was the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland to the Kingdom of Belgium with Madam Chantal Lobert, Master J.C. Vanden Eynden, Prins Sapieha, Madam Micheline Briclet and Mister Lawrence Sepulchre with the support of the Law Firm de Liedekerke Wolters Waelbroeck Kirkpatrick.
The Foundation was a partner of the Europalia Polska 2001.
The Chopin Foundation supports talented young Polish and Belgian pianists by organizing concerts every year to finance musical internships.
Every year, faithful to its objectives, the Chopin Foundation offers a prize, the “Chopin Foundation Laureate”, which represents for the young Polish talent a piano internship under the direction of Master Jean Claude Vanden Eynden at the Eduardo Del Puyeo Music Centre. The Foundation organizes for its young laureates a visit to the cities of Namur, Brussels and Bruges. Thanks to the support of the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland, a concert with the young Polish talent is also organized at the Embassy Lounges of the Republic of Poland in Belgium.
In the same spirit, a young Belgian talent will attend a piano internship in Warsaw at the Fr. Chopina Academy under the lead of great Polish masters such as Master Jablonski. Thanks for the support of the Belgian Ambassador in Warsaw, a concert is organized at the Belgian Embassy in Warsaw to honour the young Belgian talents. Tours are also organized by the Academy to make the them discover Warsaw and the places where Chopin lived.
Since 2000, many young Polish virtuosos including Malgorzata Galeziak, Wojciech Kopczak, Sylwia Michalik, Woitech Wrobel, Natalia Kotorba, Joanna Staruch Smolec, as well as young Belgians such as Georges Lison, Nicolas Paternotte, Philippe Raskin, Matias Beccera, Alexander Vaguener and others have received the prize “Chopin Foundation Laureate”. A wide range of music lovers can meet to share their passion for music and be active as patrons.
We already invited to Belgium orchestras and musicians such as the Amadeus, the Silesian String Kwartet, Marek Drewnowski, Adam Korniczewski, Aga Winska, the Frederyk Chopin quintet, the Leopoldinum and many others.
The Chopin Foundation organizes its concerts under the High Patronage of the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland in the Kingdom of Belgium.
A musical event is organized each year in the historical and prestigious Polish Embassy Lounges which open their doors to the “Friends of the Chopin Foundation”. The Embassy Lounges are located at Avenue des Gaulois, 29 in Brussels 1040, next to the Cinquantenaire parc, by the European Institutions. In 1925, The Polish Government bought the building from the Belgian Government. During WW2, it was used by the German occupation forces, and after the war, by the London Government. The windows of this early 20th Century building that was constructed for the spouses De Spoellbergh – De Neufforge, are overlooking the Arches of the Cinquantenaire, that replicates the model of the Parisian “Arc de Triomphe”.