Part 1 · magic cells
TEAM
Bouchra Lamsyeh
is a multidisciplinary artist (DJ and actress). She studied international public law (Université Paris VIII) and geopolitics (Institut Français de Géopolitique). Throughout the years, she collaborated with severals artists on projects with a strong societal impact requisitioning the access to artistic approaches (Manue Nicot, Max Waub, Hana Miletić, Jozef Wouters, Laïla Amezian, Esraa Warda, Laura Nsengiyumva, Aline Yasmin & Alex Cepile, etc.). Since 2019, she is co-directing the artistic programme of Bâtard Festival with Sabine Cmelniski. She is currently curating with Johanna Couvée a cultural program, at Kaaitheater There is Nothing Wrong with People (TiNWwP), but you cannot self-love your way out of systemic oppression, that looks at the intersection of mental health and social justice.
Sabine Cmelniski
was born and raised in Brussels. From tapdancing to learning taking dances and shiatsu classes, she has been hanging around dance and body practices since she was a little child. She studied Choreography in Amsterdam (SNDO) and during those studies, she created «Friends with Benefits», a platform exploring the notions of affective labour and friendship in the artistic practices. Besides, she worked as a dramaturg or performer with artists such as Oneka Von Schrader, Danae Theodoridou, Jija Sohn, Andrea Zavala Folache and Mercedes Dassy. She is currently completing a Master in Cultural Studies at KULeuven and co-curating Bâtard Festival (Brussels) with Bouchra Lamsyeh. She also works as a professor assistant in ISAC (Arts and Choreography department) at ARBA-ESA (Brussels).
Françoise Martin
was born in Nigeria and grew up around Africa in a culture-savvy family. She studied Communication/PR ( EFAP Lyon ) in France and moved to Brussels to pursue a Masters degree in Cultural Management ( Université Libre de Bruxelles). Since then she gained extensive experience in communication, human resources, management and music production working for Le Botanique, Vk/De Vaartkapoen and HIM Dub Festival in Portugal. Multitasker at heart, she recently joined the team as the administrative and financial coordinator of this year’s Bâtard festival.
Martín Zícari
is an Argentinian writer and cultural worker based in Brussels. He studied Latin American History at the University of Buenos Aires and later obtained a PhD in Literature and Cultural Studies at KU Leuven. His work focuses on queer identity, imagination and fiction, affects, collective action and performance. Among others, he is the author of the short novel Scalabritney (Entropía, 2015) and the prized poetry book Del Principe Azul al Hombre invisible en una semana (EMR, 2018), and a collaborating artist in the collective The Place Where Clouds Are Formed, organising exhibitions in the US and Mexico to reflect upon borders, migration and belonging. He is interested in writing and cultural work as a way of creating and sharing knowledge in an alternative way.
Charlotte Smit
was born in Brussels where she pursued a Master’s degree in cultural management at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, after a period of misguided wandering into the world of economics. She gained a wide range of experience in the cultural sector through multiple working opportunities, whether it be as a communications officer, volunteer, or production manager during live concerts. An eager music listener and nightbird, she seeks to engage in projects and events that aim at making the world a little brighter in any way they can, with the help of arts and human connections. This includes projects by There is Nothing Wrong with People, Espirito Mundo, Medeber Teatro, Ladale, the soon-to-be Attuned. She’s been a fervent Bâtarde since its 2021 edition (once a Bâtard·e, always a Bâtard·e).
Andrea Zavala Folache
is a choreographer, performer, visual artist and pedagogue. She graduated from SNDO (Amsterdam School of Choreography) and Ba Fine Arts at Complutense University of Madrid. Her work unfolds at the intersection of these two careers. The first contact with the body as a working tool comes from drawing, where the hand and the pencil become the engine of movement between the subject and the world; and from there her language crosses formats, sensitivities and feminist philosophies on cinema and painting to arrive at choreography as a support and container in which to experiment and study. How to consciously transcend form; Where does it happen, who enables it and by what means does the act of “creating”, “producing” and “working” pass? It is a choreography, understanding that it has the potential to change perception and connect with intuition, other layers of meaning and the ability to transmit them.
Nathalie Deroy
studied sound engineering at Insas before starting working on sound creations, initially for student projects. She then worked as a versatile stage manager but specialised in sound and continues to work on sound creations, including on the project “Gloria Gloria” for which she is the stage manager. She also followed a training course in acousmatic music at Musiques & Recherches in order to deepen her practice
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