In The Making: an Introduction
In de nieuwe maandelijkse column In The Making gaat Yasaman Nozari, schilder en schrijver, aan de slag rond iets dat leeft in de Vlaamse danssector; een open call, een debat, een inhoudelijke vraag, ... Niet louter journalistiek of opiniërend, maar als een gouden weg ertussen: zorgvuldig, nieuwsgierig geschreven stukken die een concreet onderwerp volgen in zijn geschiedenis, theorie en praktijk. In deze editie 'nul' stelt ze zichzelf voor: wie is ze, wat inspireert haar, wat kunnen we verwachten?
Deze column is in het Engels geschreven. Lees je liever in het Nederlands?
Can you introduce yourself?
I'm Yasaman Nozari, a painter and a writer, originally from Iran. I moved to Belgium about two years ago to study at K.A.S.K., and somehow stayed. Alongside my studies and my day job, I've always kept a creative practice going: right now I'm working on a series of paintings called Red Water, and I'm also deep in a research thread around opacity; what it means visually, conceptually, and maybe politically. I'm still finding out where that leads. The rhythm between studying, working, and making is something I'm constantly negotiating, and honestly, I find that tension generative more often than not.
How did you come in contact with Danspunt? What's your relation to dance?
I applied for a communication role, which is what I've always done alongside everything else: writing, making bridges between people and heavier subjects. That kind of work has always felt meaningful to me. But dance is also something much more personal. My mother was a dance teacher back in Iran when I was growing up. She taught women who were looking for community, for a space to be themselves, and dance really does that, doesn't it? I grew up in a household where my mother taught dance and my father played guitar, so movement and music were just part of the air. I've loved dancing my whole life. So when I encountered Danspunt, it felt like a familiar world.
What can readers expect from the column?
Honestly, I'm still finding out myself and I think that's part of it. The column is called In the Making, and in some ways that title describes the process too. I know where I want to start: with community making, what it looks like in dance, how it happens, why it matters. That feels like the right first thread to follow. But I'm curious to see how it takes shape over time, what questions it pulls me toward, what conversations it opens up.
What topics are there to explore in relation to dance?
So many! Dance sits right at the intersection of the personal and the communal, the body and the system. You can follow it into questions of access; who gets to dance, who gets to be called a beginner, who defines the audition. You can follow it into history and politics. You can look at what happens when non-Western movement traditions meet European institutions. Or simply ask: what does it mean to teach? What does it mean to perform for an audience of ten people in a community center versus a thousand in a theatre? The field keeps generating its own urgent questions, and I find that endlessly interesting.
What do you enjoy about writing?
I enjoy writing about the things that stop me in my daily life; the moments where something I thought I understood suddenly becomes a question again. And then the process of going deeper: doing the research, talking to people who have real experience, and coming back with something more layered than what I started with. Writing is how I think out loud. It's how I understand things.
Where's your favourite spot to write?
My studio, maybe. But honestly, most of the time it's De Krook.
Tekst: Yasaman Nozari