Art is Solidarity: Speech for SOTA
Several thousand artists, technicians and other workers from the cultural sector demonstrated on the Mont des Arts in Brussels on 26 November 2025 as part of a three-day strike against the federal government’s austerity measures.
Representatives from the arts non-profit organisation NICC, the artists’ platform State of the Arts and the Christian trade union, among others, took to the stage. The cultural sector is concerned about a number of measures planned by the De Wever government. These will also affect the pensions of artists receiving an artist’s allowance. They are also concerned about the further flexibilisation of the labour market and lower subsidies for federal cultural institutions. The announced cuts in Flanders and the dire financial situation in Brussels are also causing concern.
Click here for a video report of the demonstration
The following speech was given by State of the Arts for cultural sector demonstrations on the Mont des Arts on 26 November 2025, as part of a three-day strike against the federal government’s austerity measures. Text by Katleen Vermeir and Katrien Reist.
Art is solidarity
Social security. A system based on solidarity, also for artists.
It is particularly bitter that today our pensions are being targeted. I think there is anger across all sectors about the rules being changed mid-game, and even retroactively. But the impact of this in the arts sector is completely disproportionate. It is driving artists into poverty. Until now, the periods in their careers during which artists received an artist’s allowance (kunstwerkuitkering) were included in the calculation of their pension rights, but from 2031 onwards, this will only be the case for 20% of their career. In the worst case, artists will lose 1,600 euros per month, leaving them with only 327 euros per month! Try living on that!
The worst thing is that you can’t change anything about it. You can’t step into a time machine that takes you back 30 years to choose a different career. And what about young artists who want to start their art practice? The future is being taken away from us. The entire ecology of the arts is at stake.
Because is not that we have not been working FULL-TIME. After all, invisible work is also WORK. Artists are permanently active professionally, but their work is intermittent by nature, with periods under contract alternating with unpaid periods of research, development and creation. Valuing this invisible work as labour was explicitly recognised in the latest reform of the artist’s allowance, and this recognition was also adopted by the Council of State as justification for specific regulations for artists. Not as a privilege, but to create equal access to social security compared to other sectors.
Why is it considered work within the context of the artist’s allowance but not recognized as work for the calculation of pension rights? Pension rights cannot simply be expropriated without appropriate compensation. This resorts under the protection of property rights within the European Convention on Human Rights.
Legal security means clarity, predictability and stability, so that citizens can be sure that their social security is legally guaranteed. Legal security prohibits the retroactive application of new legal and regulatory provisions. What now? This government has broken the social contract. Because if THIS is possible, what else is on the agenda?
And that agenda is filling up fast. Just take a look at this agenda drawn up by the Protest Sign Library, with a selection of the budget cuts that have been announced so far. Every day, a new cut. Like a red carpet being rolled out, but not to celebrate the positive impact of the many organisations on this list. And it’s not just the federal Arizona government, but also the Flemish and Walloon governments that are eagerly participating in the cuts. Not to mention what awaits us from the Brussels Government – if it ever comes into being. It is a tsunami of savings; chop, chop, chop… Especially in Brussels, where the lives of citizens are influenced by all seven (!) levels of government. Cuts in education, childcare, healthcare, socio-cultural work, the arts… It is never-ending.
It is therefore important that we, as artists, make our voices heard and that we not only fight for our own survival, but also draw attention to the injustice done to others. Art can open minds to a different narrative. A narrative that we can develop together, based on the principle of solidarity. Because an alternative IS possible: social security MUST NOT be eroded for the benefit of companies and their shareholders, but must instead be strengthened. Solidarity is not a cost, but the source of our prosperity and well-being!