LASER Talks Brussels: Experiencing Uncertainty and Invisible Phenomena
- 19 hours ago
- 3 min read
March 12, 2026, Brussels, Belgium / Online
March 12, 2026, 7:00 PM CET (UTC +1) — Find your timezone here.
Quai des Charbonnages 30, 1080 Brussels
The event will be also live streamed via YouTube
Participants:
Artist Claire Williams
Filmmaker / anthropologist Clemence Hébert
Researcher Prof. Dr. Katrin Solhdju Université de Mons
Moderated by Frank Theys
Chaired by Alexandra Dementieva
This event brings together different approaches to experiences and phenomena that do not easily fit established categories of knowledge, including certain UFO sightings, telepathic experiences, and some therapeutic effects that remain unexplained. Rather than seeking to validate, explain, or resolve them, attention is given to how such phenomena are lived, described, and interpreted within specific historical, social, and epistemic contexts.
Attention is also given to practices of inquiry, description, and interpretation, and to the ways uncertainty can open new perspectives on knowledge and coexistence. Beyond questions of validity, the focus extends to the conditions under which certain experiences become audible, ignored, or disqualified, pointing to the cognitive, social, and democratic dimensions of knowledge practices, and to a plurality of experiences that cannot be reduced to a single framework.
Supported by Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles and CYLAND MediaArtLab
BIOS
Claire Williams
The artworks of Claire Williams take the form of woven antennas, glass sculptures filled with plasma or devices that sense the invisible. Data of radio telescopes and radio scanners materialise themselves in knitted stitches, sound vibrations or through luminous plasma. She sculpts her electronic components to make visible the electromagnetic movements from the cosmos, through our magnetosphere, to radio waves that cross our terrestrial environment or the ones emanating from our bodies and psychic activity. She co-created «The Æthers» a space that collects and reactivate practices of the invisibles found in the archives of experimental and occult sciences of the 19th and 20th century.
Clémence Hébert
is a filmmaker and independent researcher based in Brussels. She also teaches at the Agnès Varda School. Trained in film directing at INSAS and holding a Master’s degree in Anthropology from UCLouvain, her current work brings together documentary filmmaking and ethnographic field research across ufology, scientific laboratories, and mineralogical collections. Her films, including Kev (2018), Strange Land (2014), The Open Door (2014), and The Father’s Boat (2010), have screened at international festivals such as the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR), Visions du Réel (Nyon), and Cinéma du Réel (Paris), and have been broadcast on Tënk and RTBF. She is currently developing Life Beyond, supported by the Scam/Orange grant, the CBA writing grant, and the Centre du Cinéma of the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. Her ongoing ethnographic research in ufology in France and Belgium forms the basis of a forthcoming book (2026). Alongside her filmmaking and research, she has led film workshops for over fifteen years and has been actively involved with Brussels-based production and filmmakers’ support workshops (CVB, Dérives, AJC!, GSARA, CBA), serving as a workshop leader, administrator, and member of selection committees.
Prof. Dr. Katrin Solhdju
is a Researcher Professor at the Fonds national de la recherche scientifique (FNRS) at the Institute for Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Mons, Belgium. She is a member of the Groupe d’études constructivistes (GeCo) at Université Libre de Bruxelles, as well as a co-founder of the collective Dingdingdong Institute for the co-production of knowledge on Huntington’s Disease. She currently works on the history and contemporary stakes of epistemic injustices inherent to procedures of disqualification in medicine and beyond. Her theoretical tool kit comprises thinkers like William James, Isabelle Stengers and Bruno Latour. Among her numerous publications are two books, Testing Knowledge: Toward an Ecology of Diagnosis (2021) and Selbstexperimente: Die Suche nach der Innenperspektive und ihre epistemologischen Folgen (2011).
frs-fnrs.academia.edu/KatrinSolhdju
Frank Theys
is a Belgian visual artist and filmmaker renowned for his video installations and experimental documentaries. His work, most notably the trilogy Technocalyps, deeply explores the philosophical intersections of technology, science, and society. Blending visual art with critical theory, he examines the future of human evolution and existence in the digital age.
Alexandra Dementieva
is a multimedia artist, known for her interactive installations, video and digital media work that explore human perception and social psychology. She studied journalism and fine arts in Moscow and Brussels, teaches at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels, and her work has been exhibited internationally. alexdementieva.org