Looking at Brussels’ history of urban transformation can feel like looking at a doll cut up and stitched back together, again and again: parts opened up, rearranged, and sacrificed, with families and activities displaced in the face of pending demolition permits. Mais qui a tué notre quartier ? A question that sounds like an accusation, because it is one. In Brussels, our popular neighborhoods are too often treated as available ground for other people’s futures: visions come down from above, sold in the name of urgency, necessity, and progress, while those who already live there are expected to adapt, step aside, or disappear.
In a series of conference-debates, Dérive invites you on an investigative quest that asks us to think of the loss of a neighborhood not as a single event, but as a process made of plans, demolitions, pending permits, delays, expert narratives, and everyday urban violence. The ambition is clear: to centralize the neighborhoods where strategic territorial projects land, and to anchor the reflection in that territory.
The three sessions are as follows:
- Act 1 — Crime Scene: Thursday 24 September, 19:00 – 20:30
- Act 2 — Grief: Thursday 15 October, 19:00 – 20:30
- Act 3 — Resurrection/Survival: Tuesday 3 November, 19:00 – 20:30
The full program can be consulted here, and you can register using this link.