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About

FAME is a multidisciplinary, mixed media performing arts festival which aims to encourage the discovery of new, fairer, and more inclusive narratives and imaginations. This is done through the exhibition of works and reflections produced primarily by women and gender minorities.
The festival takes place yearly in the month of September at a variety of venues across Brussels. The programme consists in theater, circus, performances, concerts, film screenings, conferences, and workshops curated by people who think, people who create, people who fight…

Every year, the festival programme hosts both international and domestic artists (francophone and Dutch-speaking) as well as emerging, established, and young artists. In addition to the artists, FAME also invites grassroots associations, collectives, and activists to the festival to give voice to their work and to create networks and bridges between arts, politics, and ongoing initiatives.

Visions

 

This is not a feminist festival.

This festival doesn’t pretend to be a substitute to the sociopolitical fights that have contributed to advances in women rights and those of gender minorities in the struggle for justice and equality. This is an arts festival, but also a festival for reflection, games, discovery.

And joy too.

The function of artists is not necessarily to educate, to cultivate, to make people more intelligent or less obtuse… though this can indeed happen. Artists are individuals who simply create art. Whether they are full-time or part-time; artists on weekends, on Sundays, one day a month or even once a year, they nevertheless contribute to our imaginary worlds.

Some of these worlds are more egalitarian or more inclusive than others and it is these that we want to share with you.

As stated above, this is not a feminist festival.
This is a festival that is feminist in its conception, its creation and in dialogue with feminists.

It is a festival that values and promotes the work and creations of female and gender minority artists, people of colour, white people, cis and trans, non-binary people, homeless people, those with or without savings, those with or without disabilities visible and invisible, lesbians, heterosexuals, bisexuals, those with or without families, professionals or amateurs and those from the present, past or future…

In the broad and troubled sense.

This is a festival for those who believe that women and gender minorities also have a rightful place in the world.

Come to the festival alone or with your chosen family, with your friends, children, grandparents… You will find a space for everyone and anyone.

 

Missions

1

To contribute to the visibility, dissemination and valorisation of the work and productions of women and people from gender minorities

2

To facilitate the creation and exhibition of new, fairer, and more inclusive narratives.

3

To support the production and dissemination of knowledge on the dialogue between the arts and feminisms.

4

To offer emancipatory tools for women and minorities in the cultural sector.

5

To create a place for knowledge exchange and learning for the general public.

6

To change welcoming and accommodation practices towards artists and audiences and to rethink inclusiveness and safety in the organisation of and during the festival

Charter

FAME has given itself a series of verbs as a guide to orient our relationships with artists, audiences and between the members of the FAME team:

Programming ethos

The choice of performances and activities is justified by their relation to the annual theme and by what they contribute aesthetically and politically to the subject.

Despite the purpose of the festival (to promote gender minorities’ works), the artistic line-up will not solely focus on gender, women, and feminism. In taking the onus off gender, we give people the opportunity to freely explore the facets and nuances of their identities.

The ultimate goal is to explore what feminist thinking and knowledge contribute to art, but also what art (which is only ever an abstraction of reality – something that models, questions, and criticises it) can contribute to feminism.

In other words, how can art, as a language of its own, facilitate the invention of new, more inclusive, emancipatory, and fairer imaginaries?

Would you like to work with us? You must already know that :
1 · We mainly program theater, dance, circus and performance.
2 · We are careful to combine both local and international artists.
3 · The festival does not produce shows, only broadcasts them.
4 · We curate our program based on an annual theme ONLY.

If these 4 criteria sound right to you, drop us a mail at programmation(@)famefestival.be

History

Since 2015, with the #MeToo movement, awareness of the existence of gender inequality, violence and discrimination in the cultural sector has been growing. In 2018, following the appointment of a man as director of the Théâtre des Tanneurs, after David Strosberg was ousted in November 2017 for harassment, women in the performing arts sector rose up in protest. They denounce the fact that 80% of the financial resources in the performing arts sector are held by men, and that venue management does not leave room for women.

On 3 June 2018, following an unauthorized occupation of the Théâtre National to denounce gender inequalities in the sector, the F. (s) collective was born out of this spontaneous gathering.

In the aftermath, La Bellone is organising three days with F. (s) on the issue of gender inequality in the sector. Ecarlate la compagnie, with ULiège and la Chaufferie acte I, launched the first quantified study of gender inequality in the performing arts. The study was published in 2021 and presented at the Liège Festival in 2022.

In 2021, the Alderwoman for Culture of the City of Brussels decided to create a feminist festival to support women artists in the sector. FAME was created in August 2021, with Camille Khoury as artistic director and coordinator.

A team was recruited, and FAME (Festival where Arts Meet Empowerment) became a multidisciplinary performing arts festival to support and promote the artistic work of women and gender minorities. FAME happened for the first time in September 2022

The creation of FAME · Festival where Arts Meet Empowerment thus intends to support the work of these artists in a programme which promotes alternate ways of seeing the world and new imaginations which are fairer and more inclusive.

To find out more, here you can find some resources which address the absence of women, and gender and racial minorities in the cultural sector (in french):

Seminar La Bellone
Study Écarlate la Cie
Study Île de France

Team

Alessandro Carlucci

they, she

Relations & Encounters

where(@)famefestival.be

Anaïs Ben Ammar

she

Production

prod(@)famefestival.be

Camille Khoury

she

Artistic Direction

camille.khoury(@)famefestival.be

Romain Cassandre Versaevel

they

Finances & Administration

admin(@)famefestival.be

Effir Libilbéhéty

they

Communication

comm(@)famefestival.be

Joëlle Reyns

she

Technic

tech(@)famefestival.be

Laëtitia Miranda-Neri

she

Production Direction

laetitia.miranda-neri(@)famefestival.be

Mélina Ghorafi

she

Relations & Encounters

wherever@famefestival.be

Nadia Zoukani

she

Finances & Administration

admin(@)famefestival.be

Nino Andrieu

they, he

Communication Internship

info(@)famefestival.be

As well as

Webdesign :
Cobéa Coop

Graphic design :
Kidnap Your Designer

Translation :
neneh noï & Niall Plumb

Partners

We are immensely grateful to the city of Brussels and our precious partners, whose unwavering support fuels the dream of our festival, breathing life into it with a generosity that shines in every edition.

FAME is an initiative of the Alderwoman for Culture of the city of Brussels, Delphine Houba, who strives to contribute to the reinforcement of equity and equality in the cultural sector.
With the support of Faouzia Hariche, Alderman for Public Education, Youth and Human Resources of the City of Brussels, of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation and the National Lottery. In collaboration with visit.brussels. Discover all the cultural and touristic attractions in the neighborhood on visit.brussels.

We also extend our thanks to the various venues that open their doors to host our festival, transforming each space into a time and place where creativity comes to life, thanks to their invaluable hospitality.

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