EXHIBITIONS
Banner top of a hand with a torch, submitted by the Vrijzinnig Centrum De Schakel, Mechelen
The torch symbol was the first realisation of the Vrijzinnig Laïciserende Centra (VLCs) of Ostend and Knokke-Heist in 1971. The logo was designed by Gilbert Deygers.
Less than a year later, both the Walloon Centre d’Action Laïque (CAL – “Center for Secular Action”) and the Flemish Unie Vrijzinnige Verenigingen (UVV – “Union of Secular Humanist Organisations”) would use the torch symbol for their publications and correspondence. The Parisian organisation “Europe et Laïcité” (“Europe and Secularism”) used the symbol from 1978 onwards.
The logo consists of one “flaming torch” and six “silhouettes”. The torch is “a symbol of human consummation and expansion (science, progress, prosperity, free inquiry,...)", while the six people, clearly inspired by the symbol of the Happy Human, portray the “secular chain of brothers (friendship, love, tolerance, faith in man and humanity as the only creator of values and norms,...)". In short, they symbolise beauty, wisdom, fraternity.
This banner top, which only shows the torch, is kept at the Vrijzinnig Centrum De Schakel in Mechelen. Unfortunately, the origin of this banner top is unknown.