
The Age of Love (BE)
As part of the "Moving Identities" residency programme, the performers of the Belgian collective "The Age of Love" are researching from the perspective of second-generation immigrants, also known as "de schakelgeneratie" (the changing generation).
The Age of Love is a multidisciplinary performance collective founded in the summer of 2021 by Samuel Valor Reyes with a focus on underrepresented, diverse artist perspectives with roots in Limburg, Belgium. The Age of Love quickly became an inclusive community focused on bold spaces. This philosophy of brave spaces allows the performers to always start from a place of empowerment. In the summer of 2022, the collective presented the first performance "The Age of Love", in which they realised their philosophy in a performative framework. "The Age of Love" is about rebirth and the search for community and support when different identities come together. It shows the possibility of finding love through differences and similarities. The collective's artistic practice is influenced by spoken word, pole dance, waacking, live music and performance and provides a platform for cultural identities and languages such as Spanish, Georgian, Turkish, Armenian, Indian, Moroccan, Brazilian, Belgian and Russian, among others. In their work, they address themes related to identity, human touch, hate, oppression, activism, queerness, intersectionality, beauty, spirituality, acceptance and, of course, love.
The Age of Love was selected as the artist group from Belgium for the Moving Identities residency programme 2024-2025.
More about the Age of Love
Samuel Valor Reyes

Samuel Valor Reyes is a Spanish theatre maker and performance artist who graduated from the Toneelacademie Maastricht. Located between Andalusian roots and multicultural Limburg, life between cultures characterises Reyes' work. They starting point is their fascination with the body as a carrier of stories and memories. Reyes' practice is interdisciplinary and operates at the interfaces of image, form, movement and purpose. Recent works include "The Age of Love", "The Age of Resurrection", "The Motherfcking End of The Fatherfcking World", "Camp X-Ray", "Misfitting in", "Bootylicious Bodies", "FASHIONCLASH Afterparty" and "Ravijnenvanrimpels".
Nata Mandaria

Nata Mandaria is a socio-cultural worker and tries to incorporate these facets into her work as a writer and performer. Originally from Limburg, she found her home in Brussels at the age of eighteen. She herself likes to say that she grew up in "Little Georgia". Her artistic practice often draws on her history as the daughter of first-generation Georgian Orthodox immigrants, with all the restrictions, blessings and curses that entails. Someone once told her that everything begins with "a feeling". She gives this feeling back to the audience through rhythmically spoken words. Nata has already performed her spoken word at the Outside In Festival, FASHIONCLASH, Theatre Aan Zee and Europalia Georgia. After a four-year break, she has returned to theatre-making with her latest work "moederwittevrouwen / თეთრი დედა ქალები".
Marie Peeters

Marie Peeters studied Art History, Musicology and Theatre Studies at the University of Ghent (2018) and Film and Theatre Studies at the University of Antwerp (2019). She works as a dramaturge for theatre, circus and dance companies such as collectief dOFt, Menzo Kircz, fABULEUS and THERE THERE Company. Her text "Our paradise ... wouldn't it be the others? The Objeu in Indeterminate Correspondences by Menzo Kircz" appeared in the 2023 Documenta Spring (S:PAM, Ghent University). Since 2023 she is part of the artistic team of fABULEUS.
Host Artist Minh Duc Pham

Minh Duc Pham is the host artist of The Age of Love residency and supports the process through feedback, networking and practice sharing. He graduated in exhibition design and scenography at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design in 2019 and studied performance and design theory at the Berlin University of the Arts. Minh Duc Pham works in visual and performing arts and deals with identity in the field of tension between gender, race and class. He has been involved in productions such as "Die Große Klassenrevue", "Home Away From Home", "Be Part Of" and "Semiotics of Dirty Work". His works have been shown at the Museum der Bildenden Künste Leipzig, Stadtmuseum Dresden, Bundeskunsthalle Bonn and Haus der Kulturen der Welt, among others.