Silence Radio

Founded in 2019, Silence Radio is a multi-disciplinary artist collective with a focus on research and artistic creation between the hearing and the deaf world. Our collective comprises actress and theatre maker Dahlia Pessemiers-Benamar, choreographer Sandra Delgadillo, actor Tomas Pevenage, poet Max Greyson and designer Sibren Hanssens. As professional deaf artists, the actors Serge Vlerick and Elena Evstratova are also closely involved. 

Silence Radio wants to connect audiences, artists and art disciplines through an artistic language that communicates with everyone – regardless of colour, background, language or other characteristics. Indeed, it is differences like these that we find especially fascinating in our quest for forms of ‘integrated accessibility’ (‘aesthetics of access’): art that renews itself by speaking freely on stage, using words, images, dance, movement, music, vibration, and light. Silence Radio is the French term for ‘radio silence’. We want to be a loudspeaker for all kinds of stories that are too little heard in the arts and in society. As artists, we turn up the radio to full volume. 

Since 2021, our home base has been Villa De Vis in the Waalborrepark in Asse. In this former gardener’s cottage belonging to the Municipality of Asse, we not only rehearse our own productions, but also offer residential and research space to professional artists in need of the space to make their work more inclusive. We provide opportunities for small-scale performances in Villa De Vis and work out cultural projects there for residents of Asse and the surrounding area.  

Silence Radio also has international ambitions. We represent Belgium in the international network ACCAC (Accessible Arts and Culture), which exchanges knowledge around inclusion in the artistic field. Thus we maintain good contacts with other art organisations centred around deaf culture in Finland, Cameroon, France, Japan and elsewhere. With this expertise and experience, we aim to inspire the broader arts field in Flanders. After all, connection is our middle name.