In the visual essay In Future Hands, documentary theatre maker Hannes Dereere tries to make sense of the growing concern around lower birth rates. Today, an increasing number of people are having fewer children or none at all. Population prospects for the coming decades are dropping drastically. As politicians seem desperate to convince people to make more babies, economists and technocrats look ahead with growing concern: will the economic and political structures of today survive tomorrow’s declining population?

At the core of In Future Hands is a research of over 60 hours of conversations that Hannes undertook together with his partner Silke Huysmans. For two years, they talked to a diverse group of people such as politicians, caregivers, scientists, activists, investors, psychoanalysts, philosophers, fortune tellers etc. starting from the question: would we like to have children one day?

Now, one year later, Hannes revisits the recordings of these conversations and weaves them together alongside found footage. The result is an intergenerational collage of interviews that reflects on an uncertain future, and seeks to unravel a discriminatory and exploitative focus on population numbers. The intimate starting point slowly develops into a much broader question: what kind of world do we want to pass on in the hands of those who come after us?

Concept & creation: Hannes Dereere
Research: Silke Huysmans & Hannes Dereere
Dramaturgy: Dries Douibi
Sound mixing: Jesse De Roo
Technical support: Piet Depoortere & Jasse Vergauwe 

Production: CAMPO co-production
PACT Zollverein, C-mine & Perpodium
Residencies: CAMPO, Kunstenwerkplaats KWP, KAAP & C-mine
Thanks to all conversation partners
With the support of the Flemish Government & the Tax Shelter of the Belgian Federal Government via Cronos Invest