“The images of the society that we produce are those of the society that we are building”
André Bossuroy | Video director, MEDIEL, Belgium
After starting his career as a Civil engineer in Biotechnology, André Bossuroy chose a cinematographic path by turning to film production. As general coordinator for the MEDIEL’s projects, André develops also intercultural projects based on the production of documentary films and educational interdisciplinary workshops with artists and young people. His films are broadcasted by ARTE.tv, RTBF, VRT and European TV channels. Since 1999, its activities have offered a number of young Europeans the chance to bross the world assuming the role of citizen-reporter. Their reports are an invitation to gain a better understanding of our European society, its past, its ways of living, its institutions, its questions, and its fragilities.
Teasers of Bossuroy's historical documentary films
In 2012 Bossuroy's film "Etty Hillesum, The Convoi" was selected to be part of the 25 iconic projects (pages 60-61) of the Europe for Citizens programme of the European Commission.
Other television productions followed : 'Ich bin' (2012) about the White Rose resistance group with Hans and Sophie Scholl (Germany), the Maquis of Vercors and the Rafle of Vel d'Hiv (France) and the Katyn forest massacre (Russia); 'The Ramparts of Warsaw' (2014) about the Warsaw uprising in 1944; '30 years ago, the Fall of the Berlin Wall' (2019).
These films aim to strengthen remembrance of the recent European history, reflecting on causes of totalitarian regimes in Europe's modern history (especially, but not exclusively, Nazism that led to the Holocaust, Fascism, Stalinism and totalitarian communist regimes) and to commemorate the victims of their crimes.
The young people become "cross-borders" reporters
Looking in the direction of civil society, these citizen-reporters adopt values of openness and dialogue. Through their experience, they sometimes have the same attitudes of mistrust and prejudice that we can all experience or maintain, sometimes unconsciously, towards people and realities of which we have poor or no knowledge. These young reporters are “cross-borders” in both the literal and figurative sense. They invite us to go beyond our prejudices, to change our point of view and our mentalities to make way for new things and personal enrichment.
Mediel
As a member of the European Observatory of Memories (EUROM) network MEDIEL works with its 51 international partners on the following objectives: fostering multidisciplinary research and work on activities focused on the construction of public memory; identifying and analyzing the different memorial processes occurring in Europe and other continents from the point of view of experts, professionals and civil society (with a particular focus on European youth encounters.