Documentary filmmaker Tomas Hendriks recently finished "Decision Pending" an ‘audiovisual symphony’ about political spaces in Brussels, about the sense of uncertainty and impotence in the corridors of power. His ‘non-political film about politics’ reveals a theatricality of politics, or at least a performative framework shaping political processes.
In my paper I will propose the theoretical framework of a field study about political behavior in Brussels, on different levels: municipality, region, nation, Europe. Politics discourse will be observed as an ethnographical object, as a culturally (over)determined discourse, parallel to 'proper' cultural discourses such as architectural landmarks and city parades. The planned study should also use specifically artistic tools - re-enactments, documentary theatre - as a refinement the analysis of political performativity in Brussels, and as a contribution to the methodology of political field observation.
