How does public space in Brussels reflect our gender-specific assignations and positions?

Under what conditions and for what reasons is a space perceived as safe or hostile for women, trans, queer and non-binary people? 

Between stratefies of visibility and invisibility, what are our daily gestures of resistance and emancipation in the street and with others? And our queer gestures? 

Is Brussels a queer city?

A participatory sound art project for Brussels' public space, initiated by Anna Raimondo with the voices of Gaia, Ophélie Mac Coco, Agathe Yamina, Laura Nsengiyumva, Aïda Yancy, L.K, Quinn, Anniek Schalij, Marian Lens, Ansao Totolehibe. 

With the support of Anais Maes, Alderwoman for Urban Planning and the College of Mayor, Aldermen and Alderwomen of the City of Brussels.

Q(ee)R Codes – New Boundaries BXL 1000 is part of a long-term nomadic art project initiated by artist Anna Raimondo in 2017. In Brussels, following the BXL Universel II – Multipli.city project at Centrale for contemporary art in 2021, the project will be continued from 2025 to 2030, thanks to a commission from the City of Brussels and the alliance of several people and institutional and associative partners.

The project questions the experiences of women, trans, queer and non-binary people in their cities. Coming from a variety of geographical, cultural, generational, social and sexual backgrounds, the people the artist met were invited to take part in discussions and audio interviews with her. They recount and describe the spaces in the centre of Brussels that are most significant to them, sharing the sensations produced by these places, their stories, their memories and the projections that nourish them. 

Through listening and oral research on the one hand, and the creation of new spaces for imagination, confrontation and dialogue on the other, Q(ee)R Codes – New Boundaries BXL 1000 is intended to be a platform for reflection to tell and reimagine the place of women – understood in a broad, non-biological sense – and gender minorities in public space. 

The result is the production of 10 sound portraits, scattered around the city centre of Brussels, the locations of which are shown on the map available to the public. In each location, you‘ll find a QR code, appearing as a marble mosaic, that will allow you to listen to each audio.

The title, Q(ee)R Codes, intentionally omits the letter ‘u’ from the word ‘queer’ to escape grammar and its norms, while its pronunciation indicates the tool for listening to the sounds. 

Q(ee)R Codes also evokes the gestures that have emerged during certain encounters. These are hand gestures that resist a fixed codification and which, in their particularity and the context in which they are received, open up a wealth of symbolism. They are reproduced in five of the ten locations.

The project thus offers a map of Brussels 1000 mediated by voices, bodies and subjectivities intended as a call to listen, and as a moment of potential empathy with the voice we hear.

Concept and artistic direction: Anna Raimondo

Interviews, recordings, editing and realization: Anna Raimondo

Editing of the Flemish stories with: Ruby Bernabeu-Plous (BNA-BBOT)

Additional recordings: Flavien Gillié (BNA-BBOT), Anne Lepère

Sound mixing: Flavien Gillié (BNA-BBOT)

Graphics and illustration: Marzia Dalfini

Jingle music: David Chazam

Jingle voices: Ruby Bernabeu-Plous (BNA-BBOT), Loes Jacobs, Anna Raimondo

Creation of the marble tiles: Mosaici Moruzzi

Head of production and communications: Dounia Mojahid

Production: Moussem Nomadic Arts Centre 

with contribution from: nadine, Sveva Ventre, Romane Beau, Yanis Stefanou

Translation in Dutch: Loes Jacobs

Translation in English: Sarah Cale