Offending the politicians

Normaal gezien kwam je nu alles te weten over het Kaaitheaterprogramma van de komende weken. En toen veranderde alles. Dus geen programma deze keer – wel een verzameling bijdragen van artiesten die hun voorstellingen zagen wegvallen, en van twee artists-in-residence. Ze beantwoorden een simpele vraag: ‘Wat wil jij – vandaag – delen met het Kaaitheaterpubliek?’

Michiel Vandevelde
artist-in-residence
[25 & 26/04 – The Goldberg Variations – Kaaitheater]

Dear reader.

This text is a prologue.
You will read nothing you haven’t read before.

If you do not hold a position of power, don’t waste your time.
Read something else.

This text is addressed to you: the politician you are.
In reality, or imagined.

You will not be surprised by this text.
This text will not give you any new ideas.
It will not feed you with new insights.
What you will read will only confirm what you already know.
But that will not matter.
This text will not be bothering to you.
It will not make you angry, neither concerned.
It might amuse you.
Offer a moment of distraction, diversion, leisure.

You are the subject matter. You are the center of interest. You are not treated as an individual here. You do not become an individual here. You have no individual traits. You have no distinctive physiognomies. You have no characteristics. You have no destiny. You have no history. You have no past. You have no experience of life. You have the experience of the text here. You are a reader now. You are of no interest because of your capacities. You are of interest solely in your capacity as reader. As reader you form a pattern here. You have no personality. You are not singular. You are a plurality of persons. Your faces point in one direction. You are an event. You want to be the event. You are a pseudo-event. You have always been a pseudo-event.

They have nothing to lose but their chains. You have nothing to lose but your networks, your wires, your connectivity. Free yourself from the pseudo-event. Become a non-event. Become useful. Become the people. Stop being shortsighted. Halt your semipublic discourses produced through your factories of images. End your self-inflicted stupidity. Stop craving for attention. Stop pretending representation. Free yourself from party politics. Think beyond the here and now. Think beyond yourself. Think beyond the people. Think beyond generations. Think. Think. Think.

Each moment is historical. Each of your moments is a historical moment. You cannot read these words twice. This is no make-believe. You cannot do the same thing once again. You cannot read the same way. Time expires on your lips. Time is unrepeatable.

This text is a prologue. It is not the prologue to another piece of writing but the prologue to what you did, what you are doing, and what you will do.

Contest the power you have. Always. Love and rage.