'We are Europe': photographer Lieve Blancquaert's exhibition in Mechelen

Photographer Lieve Blancquaert has invested a lot in her new European project. Together with her bossom friend Marij De Brabandere, Blancquaert spent 5 months travelling right across Europe in a camper van.  They covered 33,000 kilometres through 27 countries in search of what binds Europeans together.

"It started from a great desire to find out what holds us together," Lieve Blancquaert explains. "Of course we are familiar with the EU, we are part of this group, but it is a complicated patchwork. 24 languages are spoken in 27 member states. Many differences divide us."

Shared concerns in east and west

Do we make a good team? Are we planning to stay together? These were the concerns that served as the starting point for the 'We are Europe' project. In addition to the many differences, Blancqaert also saw many similarities. "The big challenges in Europe are identical for all member states. Climate and migration, surely these big themes bind us all together?" she wonders.

"To create the exhibition, I talked to a lot of people and asked very simple questions. What scares you? Are you religious? Do you feel poor or rich? All this is part of a compilation in the exhibition.  You find that we definitely all share the same concerns" Blancqaert notes.

"We have the same needs, the same hopes and we experience the same fears. A lot of people today are afraid of war. Global warming is a big concern. We have the same concerns in east and west."

In addition to concerns, Blancquaert also noticed a European pride.  This is not something that she had immediately expected. "To my great surprise, almost 90 per cent answered very wholeheartedly 'yes' to this question 'Do you feel European?' On the edges of Europe, for example in the Baltic states, people shout that they are European with an even louder voice. Life is so different on the edges of Europe than in the centre, where we live. I felt that very clearly."

No politicians in the picture

"Each member state has its own culture and its own history. That past is so important and you can never erase that with European legislation. Sometimes there are clashes. We have seen this in Poland and Hungary. But for me it remains extremely important that we take this journey together."

Lieve Blancquaert deliberately decided not to speak to politicians and did not want to bring a political narrative. "You can't say Orban is Hungary, that Putin is Russia or Netanyahu is Israel. Many people in these countries think completely differently, and these are the voices that I heard."

The European ideal

Lieve Blancquaert was already a convinced European before making the TV series, the book and the exhibition and remains so. "My European feeling has remained just as strong. That is so important since the start of the war in Ukraine. If I have asked the question 'Do you feel European?' before the war, I'm sure we would have got a totally different answer."

"We have come out of a period in which we were pampered. For me, it all starts with the Fall of the Berlin Wall," Blancquaert concludes. "I was 26 at the time and I stood there and I experienced an enormous feeling of being part of a group. That naive idea: we can do things incredibly well together. It’s a feeling that has somehow stuck to me."

The 'We are Europe' exhibition in Mechelen runs at the city’s cultural centre til 30 June. It is part of the city festival Construct Europa marking the Belgian presidency of the EU Council.

'We are Europe' airs on VRT Canvas TV every Tuesday, the six episodes are already available on the VRT MAX app. A book of the same title is published by Hannibal.