J.E.F. x WANDA Panel talk

In collaboration with WANDA and deAuteurs, JEF (the youth film festival) invited industry professionals to think about how films and media can give a correct and honest representation of our society. Can young people recognize and feel respected by the audiovisual stories told today on cinema screens, television, through online channels? What steps do we take to make sure inclusive stories and processes become the norm on screens but also behind the scenes?

I was in charge of preparing and moderating this panel featuring writer Hinda Bluekens, filmmakers Kato De Boeck and Inès Eshun, and actress Nadège Bibo-Tansia.

Kulturaustausch

I was commissioned by the German magazine Kulturaustausch to contribute to their January issue “Living On Less“.

“Generation Celibacy” is a deep dive into one of the latest trends among Gen Z: celibacy – or when recession creeps between the sheets. Why are Zoomers rejecting hookup culture? How do young women use abstinence as a political statement? I always love writing about sex, because it’s never just about sex.

I’m very grateful I got to publish this piece, building a bridge between generations that don’t always understand each other and attempting to contextualise what goes on on Tiktok to Kulturaustausch’s mature, highbrow readership.

Thrift Talks (Kringwinkel Antwerpen)

What if one day, we could just reuse everything? ’cause honestly, there is already so much stuff…

Sustainability has been central in my work and life for quite some time, so this project really felt like a full circle moment. I had the pleasure to host the Thrift Talks podcast series for Kringwinkel Antwerpen, aka the official provider of my coffee mug collection, my vase collection and my second hand interior addiction.

Listen to the three chapters on Vice.com.

Thrift Talks is a Vice Media production.

Een van de goeie

“No, no, I mean like… where are you really from?”


“Oh come on, you know I don’t mean it that way“


“I don’t see you as an immigrant”


“No but you – you’re one of the good ones”.

In Belgium, one in five people have foreign roots. In my new podcast series Een Van De Goeie, I invited 8 other Belgians with an immigrant background to have open conversations about our experiences as first or second generation immigrants. We touch upon our identity struggles, the hypocrisy of the “diverse” society we live in, and how we found our way out of “just wanting to be like everybody else”.

Listen on your favourite podcast platform or watch the video version with NL, FR or EN subtitles on Youtube!

تشویش Tashweesh

تشویش Tashweesh festival took place in Tunis, Brussels and Vienna in the fall of 2022. I was invited to be the host and moderator of the festival in Beursschouwburg, Brussels, where I moderated daily panel talks about different aspects of feminism such as Trans Utopias, Power of the Domestic, Feminism and Revolution and Women of Colour in the Music Industry.

Couldn’t make it? You can listen to the talks here!

تشویش Tashweesh is a multidisciplinary cultural project spanning multiple cities, aiming to create new feminist alliances while providing a space for artistic practices and interdisciplinary research in the field of intersectional feminism in South-West Asia, North Africa and Europe. The project builds upon the experience of Tashweesh (2018), a multidisciplinary arts festival inviting artists, activists, thinkers on feminism which took place in Brussels and Cairo (with satellite programmes in Beirut and Tunis) and is co-funded by Creative Europe and carried out by Beursschouwburg (Belgium), Tanzquartier Wien (Austria), Goethe-Institut Brüssel (Belgium) and L’Art Rue (Tunisia). 

 

Famous Pets

During a depressive episode, I made a custom T-shirt inspired by vintage band shirts, using my favourite snaps of my dog Biceps, just as a pick-me-up to lol alone at home. The result was so cool that I did a reprint for the Biceps fans, and ended up making a few custom T-shirts for friends’ pets.

Famous Pets was born! You can now order a custom T-shirt based on one of the available templates, or order a full custom design.

All Famous Pets T-shirts are printed in Belgium and The Netherlands with ecofriendly ink on high quality, sustainable 100% cotton Stanley/Stella T-shirts.

No Offence

No Offence started as a passion project during one of the many lockdowns during the pandemic. Eager to have meaningful personal conversations but short of a platform, I borrowed a few microphones and asked online community radio We Are Various if they would host me. 

Long story short, they did, and I recorded 15 episodes about various themes such as religion, alcohol, gender, activism, polyamory, money… every episode featured two guests who came to speak about their personal experiences and confront their points of view with each other.

You can listen to No Offence (NL) on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and every other major podcast platform.

VICE Belgium

I regularly write editorial and advertorial content for VICE Belgium, with subjects spanning from sex to the environment, mental health, drugs, music, or really weird habits I come across.

Read my VICE articles in NL, FR and EN.

Nacht.be

Back in April 2022, nacht.be invited me to moderate a panel talk “towards a safe.r space in nightlife“, together with psst mlle and meldet.org. In this panel, we exchanged experiences and ideas to improve safety in clubs and bars: how do we educate ourselves, our audiences, our staff to handle vulnerable communities in a way that guarantees their safety and right to enjoy their time out? What principles of inclusion, decolonization, feminism… do we apply to create spaces where absolutely everyone can feel good and let their hair down? More than words and policies, how do we create actions and apply sanctions that radically improve everyone’s experiences in nightlife?

Read nacht.be’s blogpost about the evening.

Photo Jente Waerzeggers

Full Circle

In November 2021, just as the government was gearing up to announce a new forced closing of all nightlife spaces, Antwerp nightlife concept Full Circle and Stad Antwerpen invited me to host Inside The Circle, an industry-specific panel talk on various urgent themes touching upon nightlife in the Diamond City: Nightlife culture and economy in Antwerp, Urban development and the impact on the club scene, Health and safety in our nightlife scene and new COVID measures.

You can rewatch the entirety of the talk here.