Reimagine Horst

In 2019 Horst focused on ASIAT - a former military site with two iconic cooling towers as a backdrop - and part of Vilvoorde, a suburb north of Brussels. The ambitions for the site share a common ground with Horst's mission to develop spaces and cities. In time it will grow into a new city district with various facilities and public functions, meeting the needs of the fast-growing population.

Horst uses art, architecture, and music as instruments to activate a district in transition and stimulate the development of ASIAT. The ASIAT site comprises 6 hectares of urban space with over twenty warehouses, all shaped in different sizes and arranged within a maze of corridors, green, urban spaces and two iconic cooling towers as a backdrop. It is the ultimate, blank canvas for Horst. It reminds us of a long lost power structure, almost irrelevant in today's society. A space to be activated and infused with artistic, creative and urban initiatives.

The terrain housed soldiers who were responsible for the production and maintenance of components for military telecommunication and reparations to military vehicles. Documents speak of massive tanks, of performance and productivity, of ingenious engineering. But Asiat’s vast warehouses, efficient barracks and spacious driving courts have been taken over by nature when this military post shut down. Time stood still.

Artists and architects from various backgrounds, and with diverging practices, were commissioned to conceive new projects, or recontextualise existing work for this occasion and context — absorbing and regenerating the site of Asiat. These works thread together in an artistic route that amplifies the site, drawing on its particular character and history, as well as its current realityand future potential. They are the mediator between the terrain and its users. They address issues relating to the personal as well as to the collective, to the local as well as the macro.

They hope to incite contemplation, to stir critical thought, to encourage empathy, to touch, to soothe and to excite.

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The three-day music festival, with an experimental curated selection of newcomers alongside solid fixtures of the electronic music scene, counts as the final momentum of Fallen empires and refound desires. It transforms Asiat into a dynamic and explosive site, resonating with all kinds of audiences, and refiguring the exhibition as an immersive atmosphere for the festival. It performs the potential of rave as a regenerative force, as a trigger for solidarity and congeniality, and as a reminder to join forces.

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