Re-building

The programme from January to June announces the last moments of our time together here in this house by Sainctelette square. For almost thirty years, Kaaitheater has been inhabiting this place with visions, movements and ideas on stage. Thirty years of history and yet in six months time, this building will be closed for major renovations and over the next season, most of what we will see will be torn-down walls, rubble and reinforced concrete structures.

But a construction site is also beautiful. It heralds new beginnings.

In a way, the renovation works already started a while ago. By adopting HOW TO BE MANY? as a motto, and then understanding the scope of the question, it became clear that a fresh coat of paint would not suffice as an answer. The building must be torn down. We’re taking down the load-bearing walls, knocking down partitions, exposing the foundations. Of course, it is not easy to deconstruct an entire structure and once that is done, we will have to reinvent everything again. While the building renovations will take at least two years, we cannot tell you when the renovations undertaken in the heart of the organisation will end.

So, we don’t know when we’ll be done, but bit-by-bit, we draw new plans, inviting other people around our sketches. In the meantime, we are trying to build small structures, just to try things out. Sometimes they collapse with a bang. Sometimes they hold out the prospect of tremendous subversions.

For example, by changing the way we think about pricing: we have been offering the {PAY WHAT YOU CAN} pricing policy for several months now, and thanks to this, we have seen more than a thousand people who had never entered through our doors, which we thought were wide open, before. This was made possible by the solidarity of those who chose to contribute beyond the suggested price. Thank you!

New and established voices have coexisted on the theatre stage. It is joyful to hear them mingle, dissonant and generous. Many more will be joining them this year, and we hope you will enjoy discovering them.

We have also assigned twenty percent of our budget to other organisations based in Brussels, offering them a place in the Kaaitheater’s programming and complete artistic independence. This has led to some brilliant moments, thanks to Citylab, For All Queens! and Mothers & Daughters, and will continue with Moussem and Mophradat.

During the renovations, our programme will be supported by the many houses and theatres in Brussels and the surrounding areas that have responded to our proposals for cooperation in a spirit of solidarity. We will strengthen our relationship not only with them but also with you, our audience, and continue to learn to reflect the polyphony of Brussels. Over the next two years, Kaaitheater will be a de-centred, roaming arts centre.

Whether you want to say goodbye to Kaaitheater as you have known it until now, or come and discover it for the first time, you are welcome. We hope you too will take part in our nomadic journeys through the city during the next two seasons and will be just as much part of the new building, which we will be able to inhabit with new visions and multiple voices.

See you soon?

–  MARIA DOGAHE 
new programmer at Kaaitheater