We live in a world where the nation-state is presupposed for all communities and where the centralisation of power has reigned supreme. Extractivist capitalism is put forward as the only viable alternative, and past colonialism continues into the present in the form of unpayable debts and military occupations dressed up in the garb of valiant, charitable humanism. Over there, people find themselves strangled by relationships of over-exploitation and try to reach the Schengen area in search of conditions of survival. At the same time, here, the globalisation engendered by colonial capitalism is exacerbating insecurity and the loss of social achievements. It contributes to the erasure of memories, cultures, histories and languages, and generates a deculturation that masks its distress in the cry of an excluding quest for national identity.
In the specific context of Belgium, where we live, we feel it is necessary to analyse the national novel and its modes of representation, and to link it to the rest of the world. From this country, home to the capital of Europe and the headquarters of NATO, and through our theatrical and cinematographic practices, we seek to turn our gaze back to our history, our enslavings, by carrying out an ethnology of our own environments and our own contexts.
We are currently writing a play, L'Extinction des villages (for Julie Jaroszewski) and a film, Kolonie 7 (for Pauline Fonsny). We both delve deep into Belgian history, uncovering forgotten narratives of minority and precarious bodies. Although the two spaces we work in are distinct (theatre and film, Wallonia and Flanders), they have much in common in terms of the buried memory of those driven out by history. Two projects in which the village (created organically from below) and the colony (imposed from above) look at each other and reveal themselves. Two stories which, by taking the time to talk to each other, tell of industrialisation, fossil capitalism, the disappearance of provincial languages and the domestication of populations.

Julie Jaroszewski trained at INSAS in Dramatic Interpretation. As an actress, she has worked mainly with Lorent Wanson and Armel Roussel. She also wrote and directed Ali Aarrass's Chœur at the Théâtre National and two films: Standards and Qui es tu Octobre? She studied Black and Southern Marxism at CLACSO and at Madrid's Complutense University. In her work, she attempts to establish a link between colonisation and the death of popular cultures on the outskirts of colonial metropolises.

Pauline Fonsny trained as a philosopher (ULB) and editor (INSAS). In 2019, she directed her first film, the short À l'usage des vivants, followed in 2021 by a radio documentary À leurs corps défendants. She is currently working on a feature film, Kolonie 7, on the borderline between fiction and documentary. Her work focuses on the structural racism of Belgian and European policies, and more specifically on the detention and eviction of 'foreigners' from the country where she lives.