Lieve Blancquaert excels in her field but enjoys expanding her radius of action. Besides her core business photography, where she has made a highly personal imprint, she likes to look over the fence. She traveled the world to capture unique moments in human life, from birth to death and how it is experienced in different cultures, in a mix of attentiveness, involvement and respect. Alliances with other art forms broaden her focus and worldview. A few years ago, for example, she wrote the excellent monologue 'Misschien Marieke' together with Greet Jacobs.
Photography, tv-formats and a theater production all adorn her portfolio, soon to be enriched with concerts. An enticing perspective on her professional horizon that she has already tried out once. In August, a follow-up will be created in a cross-over with Barbora Kabátková artistic director of the vocal Tiburtina Ensemble. Kabátková likes to focus on female composers and the lives of women in the Middle Ages are for her, just as today with feminist Lieve Blancquaert, a common thread in her career. Two artists who understand each other strongly. They are steadily building an oeuvre that invites reflection on the 'condition humaine'. Images and music with their own signature and attention to layering. Lieve Blancquaert explains this new adventure and the structure of the performance.
-You are an advocate of international networking with women, both on a human and artistic level?
Yes, that is indeed my hobby horse, so to speak. I think it is still very much necessary to talk about it. Of course, if you look at the practice here with us, it's not that bad. We have self-determination in the meantime, have been able to vote since 1948. In short: we are allowed to do a lot of things but still there is a discrepancy between the treatment of women versus men even here with us. Worldwide, the cards are completely different when it comes to the implementation of women's rights and awareness of women's emancipation.
-There is already a lot on your resume … the link with music, a concert is still largely open.
This is the third time I'm doing something like this. About six years ago I also did something similar at AMUZ with the choir Currende. For the commemoration of the Great War, I realized in the chapel of a castle monastery in Loppem a similar concert with image, text and music, also in collaboration with Currende. Specifically around the theme of war. Laus Polyphoniae, the summer festival of AMUZ, under the title CONTRAPUNT van het leven exposes the essence of polyphony, but at the same time pauses on those events in a human life where polyphony is a must.
-'Zie een vrouw' brings the best elements of music and your photography together.
The best I won't say, but the most appropriate. It will be very much concentrated on my personal experiences with girls and women during the reports I made. Actually, it connects with 'Circle of Life' my worldwide search for man, his rituals, traditions and customs and the most universal moments of birth, love and death. I draw from the visual material I made during my travels. A story about what unites us and sets us apart. I distill the highlights from it and tell about my experiences. There are image montages, stories, everything flows together and merges with the polyphonic choir.
-Visual material that will be seen to the measure and rhythm of the music. In compiling the program, there was divergence and convergence.
I hope so. Such a compilation is not ready in one, two, three. Barbora Kabátková and I try to find each other very much in it, but at the same time it may clash a lot for me. It will not be a harmonious perfect coherence, the approach does not lend itself to that either. We still have to rehearse a lot. I have the image montage ready in the meantime but it can always change. We are very flexible in that. It should paint a broad picture. I want to leave room and also respond to current events. We will perform 'Zie een vrouw' twice and then see if there is a follow-up.
-Your photographic material will be embedded in the music as you go.
Indeed. Barbora Kabátková has chosen songs that fit the context, there is a coherence with the images and my stories, but not necessarily one-to-one. Finding the right material is an intense search. What I find fascinating is that both worlds find a lot of connection with each other.
-It was a commission for Laus Polyphoniae. Result a deeply human combination of female voices with universal and at the same time unique images.
Indeed, connection is central and combines contemporary universal images with old music and different female voices. The production thus forms a bridge between the lives of centuries ago and those of today.
-The whole is greater than the sum of its parts?
Absolutely. I'm looking forward to it. We are completely ready to make something memorable out of it.
WHAT: Festival van Vlaanderen Antwerpen – Laus Polyphoniae '22
AMUZ: Lieve Blancquaert & Barbora Kabátková, 'Zie een vrouw'
WHEN: 23 August at 20.00 and 22.15