Politricks: power play at the Beursschouwburg

(© Marta Popivoda)

We’ll have to wait and see what you and I conjure up in May, but in expectation of the elections, it doesn’t hurt to spend some time thinking. About power, propaganda, populism, and patriotism, for example. In its new focus programme Politricks, the Beursschouwburg is casting its spotlights on the mechanisms that shape and distort images in the corridors of power. We browse through the programme with director Tom Bonte.


EVERY BEGINNING HAS AN END
“Politricks is an invitation to look at politics and media from an artistic viewpoint, with a bit of distance and without predilections. To start off with some confusion, we invited Superamas to do a theatrical intervention. They have a long history with the Beursschouwburg, and when we discussed the flag installation they will be presenting, it turned out one of them was working on a short monologue, a speech such as a politician might deliver. That fitted our story perfectly. Erik Bünger, who has an exhibit running at Argos (> 30/3), will round-out the double bill. He doesn’t address politics directly, but talks about image formation and manipulation. Music will be provided by Lucky Dragons and Fatima Al Qadiri, a great musician from the London underground who never shies away from taking a stance.

(Fatima Al Qadiri)

We’re closing Politricks with The Political Party. Politicians aren’t allowed to take part in game shows on TV anymore, but they can engage in debates. We want to challenge them to do so through music. Each party can play three songs to make their political statement. They can play anything from ‘Formidable’ to ‘La crise’. [Laughs] And no, we are not providing a microphone.”
Opening Weekend 7 & 8/2 (Superamas & Erik Bünger: €5/7 / Lucky Dragons & Fatima Al Qadiri: €12)
The Political Party 29/3, 22.00, free
Erik Bünger: Written on Tablets of Flesh > 30/3, Argos


THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER
“The young Serb Damir Todorovic will share the stage with Martin Schick for Holiday On Stage (7 & 8/3), but there will also be a solo performance of his powerful new piece. In As It Is, he hooks himself up to a lie detector and has a journalist question him about his role in the Bosnian War. It is a very tense and violent history, and he addresses it very frankly.

There are only two people on the stage, and the audience sits very close and listens to his story. But at the same time, you realise that you’re watching a play that has been rehearsed and that the journalist is an actress too. That undermines the objectivity of the lie detector because you can’t be nervous about a lie that you’ve rehearsed. At a certain point the whole system implodes because they are constantly pushing the boundary between fiction and reality. But it works incredibly well. I still don’t exactly know what is true or not. If it is fiction, they make it look remarkably believable.”
Martin Schick & Damir Todorovic: Holiday on Stage 7 & 8/3, 20.30, €8/10/12
Damir Todorovic: As It Is 14 & 15/3, 20.30, €8/10/12


A MITT SUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
“While putting together the programme, it struck us that in the performing arts, very often the movement is from the individual to the political system, while the Politricks exhibition inverses that dynamic: from dictators and rulers down. That’s probably because visual artists focus more on image and image formation. Take Marijke De Roover, for example, whose work stems from a fascination for Mitt Romney. Romney is an iconic figure, but how can we get beyond the image we have of him? De Roover has created a playful, slightly audacious piece about five women who together want to become Romney’s harem.

(© Benj Gerdes & Mark Wallinger)

Benj Gerdes and Mark Wallinger also address the images that politicians develop of themselves. They took speeches by George Bush and Margaret Thatcher and kept only those fragments in which they don’t speak. Bush delivered long speeches, but from his body language, you can tell that he actually didn’t say very much; he spends most of his time gesticulating and staring into the distance strangely. You discover a different person from the same material. Annie Kevans turns that around: she makes paintings depicting children who turn out to be infamous dictators.”
Politricks Expo 7/2 > 29/3, wo/me/We > vr/ve/Fr 12 > 18.00, za/sa/Sa > 19.00, free


POWER TO THE PEOPLE
"The Brussels debates organised by Wij Brusselaars might be considered the cement that links up all the artistic projects and makes them tangible. There will be some do-it-yourself during the Speech Battle in collaboration with deBuren, and it is also central to the Growfunding project, which is founded on the idea that we can potentially operate differently, thinking from particular needs.

(Speech Battle)

It is a nice addition to classic politics. Growfunding is real grassroots democracy, from the bottom up. In an ideal world, those two would meet somewhere in the middle.”
Wij Brusselaars debates 13/2, 20/3 & 24/4, 20.00, NL + FR
Growfunding Bazaar 14/2, 14.00 & 15/2, 15.00 + "Slow"funding - Valentine's Party, free
Speech Battle 13/3, 20.30, NL, free


BEYOND WORDS
“Breivik’s Statement by Milo Rau is perhaps the most political performance at Politricks. It is the verbal testimony Anders Breivik – the right-wing extremist Norwegian who shot 69 young people on the island of Utøya and killed another 8 with a bomb blast in Oslo in 2011 – delivered at his own trial. The performance makes feelings run high, but what exactly is so controversial about it? What Breivik said or the fact that an artist has made a piece about it? As a society we have to be able to relate to that.

(© IIPM)

To what extent can we broach these themes without immediately becoming divided between left and right? After the reading Milo Rau is holding a debate with Kris Verdonck, Dyab Abou Jahjah, and journalist Stefaan Meerbergen. The day after, he will also be screening his documentary The Moscow Trials, about the Pussy Riot trial.”
Breivik’s Statement 28/3, 20.30, €8/10/12
The Moscow Trials 29/3, 20.30, €5/7 (combi ticket 28 & 29/3: €15)


POLITRICKS • 7/2 > 29/3, Beursschouwburg, rue Auguste Ortsstraat 20-28, Brussel/Bruxelles, 02-550.03.50, www.beursschouwburg.be