NENIA

concert, sound poetry

How do you deal with the death of a loved one? What does it mean to live on in the presence of absence? Is there hope to be found in memory, in the arts, in the encounter with the other? And is every goodbye really a new beginning?

After the compelling Misia, the ensemble Revue Blanche is creating a new performance with audio artist Katharina Smets. Nenia – literally ‘song for the dead’ – is somewhere between a concert, radio play and sound poem. Composer Frederik Neyrinck is writing a brand-new score, custom-tailored for this unique quintet. In doing so, he was inspired by Monteverdi’s opera L’Orfeo, about the mythical poet-singer who descends into the underworld to retrieve his beloved.

Katharina Smets, the four musicians and videographer Lise Bruyneel guide the listener through a magical-realist world between dream and parable, darkness and light.

credits

audio, voice & text: Katharina Smets
composition: Frederik Neyrinck
soprano: Lore Binon
flute: Caroline Peeters
viola: Kris Hellemans
harp: Anouk Sturtewagen
video: Lise Bruyneel
dramaturgy: Katherina Lindekens
technical support: Jannes Dierynck & Brecht Beuselinck
costumes: RE Antwerp
subtitles: Liesbet Termont
audiomix: Wederik De Backer
outside eye: Jurgen Delnaet
translation to French: André Verkaeren

in coproduction
with LOD, Klarafestival, Flagey & CC De Factorij

with the support of the Flemish Government

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LAND

performance

With LAND, a multimedia documentary performed live, we focus our gaze on a small immigrant community in Detroit. Their ancestors left Belgium hoping for a better life. Now they use old games, traditions and rituals in their own way. Together with Detroit artists Marsha Music, Wayne Juuni and Desmond Love, The Space Between follows a group of Belgian-Americans in the middle of this super diverse city. How do they hold on to their roots?

LAND unites stories and rituals, perspectives and histories in a multimedia documentary performance.

LAND was part of Katharina's PhD on the attitude of the audio documentary maker at the Royal Conservatoire in Antwerp and University of Antwerp.

Special thanks to Selm Wenselaers, Jerome Lemenu, Anna Marie Vanneste Swarthout, Maurice Vanneste, Cheryl Heckla, Margaret Roets & the Genealogical Society of Flemish Americans, Marc Tirikian, Ron Devos & the Belgian Feather Bowling Club of the Cadieux Café
Premiere 25.11.2021
LOD studio, Ghent

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A documentary performance made and performed by The Space Between: Inne Eysermans, Ingrid Leonard & Katharina Smets

Concept & Text: Katharina Smets
Concept & Image: Ingrid Leonard
Concept & Sound/Music: Inne Eysermans
Poetry & Guidance: Marsha Music
Cinematography Poem & Locations Detroit: Desmond Love
Location Sound Mixer & Location Scouting: Wayne Juuni
Production: Juliet Hinely
Set Design & Construction: Samyra Moumouh & Hans Demeulenaere
Graphic Design: Mo Neuharth
Light Design & Technical Assistance: Jannes Dierynck / Brecht Beuselinck

Technical Advice: Gertjan Biasino
Management: Klein Verzet VZW
Coproduction: LOD Muziektheater, Kunstencentrum Vooruit & C-TAKT
Support: De Vlaamse Gemeenschap

press

De Standaard05.11.2021
Radio 1Interne Keuken, Radio 1, VRT, 11.11.2021
PompidouKlara, VRT, 11.2021

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DE STEMMEN

podcast

De stemmen (The voices) is a podcast by Opera Ballet Vlaanderen (Belgium). There's an opera behind every person's life, and we go looking for it. Each episode collects personal stories around one timeless theme that gives meaning to the arts and to life itself.

Release date 25.10.2020

credits

Listen to the series:

Soundcloud

Also available on:
Spotify
Youtube
Apple Podcasts
PodBean
iHeart
Podchaser

Host: Katharina Smets
Sound designer: Maarten Buyl
Editor-in-chief: Katherina Lindekens
Producers: Annelien De Rycke and Noemi Suarez Sanchez
Editors: Sarah Aernoudt, Ilse Degryse, Wilfried Eetezonne, Claïs Lemmens, Joren Sanders and Tom Swaak
Interns: Emma Vanderstraeten, Margot Timmermans and Karolien Bosmans
Advisor: Randy Vermeulen

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De StandaardAnnemarie Peeters, In elk mensenleven schuilt een opera, 04.11.2022
Klara
Olav Grondelaers, Music Matters, Klara, VRT, 29.10.2020

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photography - Sanne Delcroix

FOTOGRAF

performance

In about a hundred photos the same young woman poses in a white summer dress or swimming costume. She sits in a tree or looks out over the lake, sometimes smiling at the boy behind the camera. She seems carefree, even though her small Polish town is occupied by Germans. Together with the photographs, Katharina Smets inherited an unsolved story about her grandmother, set in the summer of 1941.

Sound artist Inne Eysermans and historian/photographer/video artist Ingrid Leonard travelled with audio storyteller Katharina Smets to the small Polish town where the photos were taken. In Fotograf, they weave a personal story with documentary material from today's Poland.

Fotograf takes place in the past and the present, in memory and its distortion. History is not fixed but determined in the present. In the documentary performance Fotograf, image, language and sound are created and mixed live. As a result, this Polish family history takes no fixed form and is constantly rewritten. Divergent interpretations of the past can coexist.
Premiere 15.03.2019LOD studio, Ghent

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Collective
The Space Between: Katharina Smets, Inne Eysermans, Ingrid Leonard

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Forum+FORUM+, Volume 27, Issue 1, 03.2020, p. 24 - 32
Het Bos
Het Bos Magazine, Interview with Inne Eysermans, Katharina Smets & Ingrid Leonard, 2019

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MISIA

performance

Misia is a musical narrative about the life of Misia Sert (1872-1950): the queen of Parisian salons, but also of broken dreams and failed love. Her life life was full of glory and tragedy, sha had a captivating artistic network and a searing musical passion. Revue Blanche and Katharina Smets go in search of a lost era: the belle époque in which she lived. Misia had Belgian ancestors, was a pivotal figure in the French music scene at the turn of the century, but is no longer known to the general public today. This search for her dreams, desires and disillusions leads, among other things, to the iconic magazine “La Revue Blanche”, co-founded in 1889 by Misia's first husband Thadée Nathanson. Using an exquisite music selection and documentary audio scenes, real and fictional storylines are woven into a unique chronicle, in which reality often proves stranger than fiction. Misia focuses on pure listening to music, sound and story, stripped of trappings or visual distractions. This historical snapshot transcends anecdotalism and confronts then and now through big themes in small stories.
Premiere 26.01.2019
De Singel, Antwerp

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Scenario & narration: Katharina Smets

Soprano: Lore Binon
Flute: Caroline Peeters
Harp: Anouk Sturtewagen
Viola: Kris Hellemans

Arrangements: Frederik Neyrinck
Musicological research: Sofie Taes
Research: Katharina Smets together with ensemble Revue Blanche

Voice actor: Kurt Van Eeghem
Audio mix: Wederik De Backer

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MISIA

Misia
The forgotten queen of Paris

Misia’s life inspired the greatest masterpieces of the 20th century. Who was this charismatic woman?

Misia Godebska Natanson Edwards Sert was a patron and a muse of the avant-garde in Paris. With her keen eye and charm, she influenced the art, music and even fashion of the early 20th century. Her extravagant personality inspired writers like Marcel Proust and Jean Cocteau, her knowledge of music steered the revolutionary compositions of Eric Satie and Igor Stravinsky. With friends like Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Coco Chanel, she caused destruction and renewal of art. Following Misia's memoirs, Katharina Smets explores the spectacular life of the almost forgotten queen of Paris.

The podcast was nominated for Prix Marulic. In 2020 the podcast Misia (VRT-Klara) has been awarded 3rd prize in the category Music for Media in the prestigious Prix Europa – Media Competition for all over Europe.
Release 06.01.2019
Klara, VRT

credits

Listen to Misia:

Soundcloud

Scenario & narration: Katharina Smets

Soprano: Lore Binon
Flute: Caroline Peeters
Harp: Anouk Sturtewagen
Viola: Kris Hellemans

Arrangements: Frederik Neyrinck
Musicological research: Sofie Taes
Research: Katharina Smets together with ensemble Revue Blanche

Voice actor: Kurt Van Eeghem
Audio mix: Wederik De Backer

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VRT MAX
Misia series, VRT

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illustrations © Randall Casaer

CULTUURLOKET

interview

Host: Raf Njotea
Gast: Katharina Smets
Muziek: Susobrino

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Cultuurzaken is een podcast van Cultuurloket.

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Watch other episodes by Cultuurzaken here

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