Het Huis Hasselt (HHH) is a platform for the performing arts with a focus on young people. Among their main activities are dance and theatre projects within OKAN education (Reception Classes for Non-Dutch-Speaking Newcomers). They also organize in-depth work weeks that take place during school holidays in which motivated and enthusiastic OKAN youth and asylum seekers voluntarily participate. In these projects, young people are introduced to the performing arts by working together with professional artists.

In the summer of 2025, several such projects were organized – both in the Heusden-Zolder center for asylum seekers and in the cultural center Hasselt (CCHA). Leen Braspenning of Brasart was asked to coach and conduct  three weeks’ of these artistic activities, in close cooperation with two other artists and with HHH’s founder Lola Bogaert.

The participants (of all ages) expressed themselves in various formats and art forms, always starting from Leen’s prompts. They sketched their own hands, and explained their design choices in an interview. They sang and recited poetry, wrote a short theatre monologue and performed it. The results were presented in an artistic presentation (at each of the locations where the workshops took place), for a private audience.