Meet the Borderlines Team!

Borderlines is the platform for poetry and stories in the Meuse-Rhine Euregion. It all started in 2016 when Merlijn Huntjens contacted Oscar Malinowski on Facebook to ask if he would be interested in an Dutch – German slam culture exchange program, since Merlijn was planning to organise Limburgian poetry slam championships anyway. Luckily, Oscar was interested so they organized four slams with German guest performers in Heerlen, Sittard, Roermond and Venlo. A year later, in 2017 they held their first real Euregion Poetry Slam with a stage in Aachen hosted by Satznachvorn and a two language finale in Heerlen. That year, Oliver Vogt joined as well. Another year later they would ad Eupen to the list with the help of Marc Cürz and in 2021 Liege would be next.

Our team

The Borderlines team consists of cultural and Literairy organisations, artists and organisers from all over the Euregion.

Pascal Moors

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Wouter Greven

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Lukas Knoben

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Hanna Zwart

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Ina Engelhardt

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Oliver Vogt

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Marc Cürtz

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Oscar Malinowski

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Nina Willems

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Merlijn Huntjens

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Would you like to join a Poetry Slam?
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Borderlines Education

At the moment, we are developing our educational offering to strengthen writing education in schools. We will conduct pilots in the Parkstad-Limburg region as soon as possible. Does this sound interesting for your school? Contact us, we are happy to tell you more!

Pascal Moors
About
Pascal Moors (www.noseforphotography.nl) has been involved in Borderlines Euregion Poetry Slam since the very beginning. He is an enthusiastic photographer and is almost a performance on his own.
He likes to take unusual angles in strange positions and surprises us with nice in-depth shots of all our events. Sometimes he disappears suddenly and pops-up somewhere unexpected.
He can move with stealth as well.
Pascal is dedicated to promote our poetry slams through pictures and positivity.
His photography reports are more or less storytelling by themselves. That fits a poetry slam nicely.
Wouter Greven
About

Fresh out of the womb Wouter quickly realised that, for him at least, everything revolves around music, film and literature. A career unrelated to these things has never been an option. So, with some luck and after earning master’s degrees in journalism and film, he got a job as a film programmer in Maastricht. On the side he very much likes to freelance as a writer/interviewer (currently for Borderlines and Pop in Limburg) and as a moderator/host of cultural events (like Story-Line). So far all is good – adult Wouter does what baby Wouter hoped he would.

Wouter is our Euregion Reporter.

Lukas Knoben
About

Lukas Knoben is a German author, poetry slammer and one of the moderators of Borderlines and Satznachvorn in Aachen.

Born in Mönchengladbach in 1997, now living in Aachen, he has been touring the stages in German-speaking countries since 2015. In his works, where you can literally hear his love for German-language rap music, he approaches everyday topics sometimes in a serious, sometimes in a funny way. In 2017 and 2019, his texts brought him to the finals of the North Rhine-Westphalian Slam Championship. In addition to his work as a stage poet, he is studying to be a teacher in Aachen and gives workshops for creative writing.

Hanna Zwart
About

After a BA History and MA Arts & Culture — as well as a short stint as a bartender in Maastricht — Hanna has been working as a freelancer in the cultural field since 2017, particularly in Parkstad. She specializes mainly in production related work, with a fondness for community arts and the niche. Besides Borderlines, she also works for PANDA, Cultura Nova and SCHUNCK Museum.

Ina Engelhardt
About

Ina Engelhardt studied communication and cultural education and was involved in a variety of European projects, reaching from theater and fine arts to film and heritage. Since 2019 she has been accompanying literature projects, promoting linguistic and cross-border exchange in the Euregio Maas-Rhine, which later resulted in forming the cultural association EuregioCulture, founded in 2020 in Liège.

EuregioCulture is the Walloon sister of EuregioKultur e.V. and organizes projects which cherish the cultural and linguistic exchange in the entire Euregio Meuse-Rhine. At the moment, their focus is on literature projects, aiming for promoting young talents, arousing curiosity for the neighboring regions and developing a broader network of cultural actors.

At Borderlines, Ina coordinates the Walloon artists and the translations.

Oliver Vogt
About

Oliver Vogt has been Managing Director of the Euregio Kultur e.V. since 2013. Oliver translates all Borderlines documents, supports the organization of Borderlines Eupen and supports the team with the further artistic development of the German branch of Borderlines.

Oliver studied cultural and media studies in Frankfurt. He worked as a lecturer and research assistant at the University of Trier and the RWTH Aachen and obtained his doctorate from the University of Cologne. He then became active in the Aachen region and was involved in the promotion of cross-border cultural exchange in the Euregio Meuse-Rhine.

Euregio Kultur e.V. is a non-profit organization dedicated to language and cross-border cultural exchange in the Maas-Rhine region. It was founded in 2013 and carries out projects through its own sponsorship of (Euregio Youth Literature Award, The Euregio reads NXT TXT).

Marc Cürtz
About

Marc Cürtz has been working for Cultural Association Chudoscnik Sunergia VoG Eupen since 2001. He is responsible for the music, cabaret and poetry slam program. Marc supports the organization of Borderlines Eupen.

The cultural association Chudoscnik Sunergia VoG organizes artistic and cultural events with the dedication of 70 motivated volunteers and 16 professional members in eastern Belgium. The aim of the association is to enrich cultural life at the local, regional and national level, preferably through niche offerings. They create space for contemporary art and culture and pay attention to a wide variety of content and quality.

Oscar Malinowski
About

Oscar has been part of the German poetry slam scene since 2011 and one of the moderators for Borderlines and Satznachvorn in Aachen.

Over the years, he has performed in Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and the Netherlands. As an organizer, he is responsible for numerous event series in and around Aachen, including the monthly poetry slam »satznachvorn« or the popular campus slam at RWTH University, which is attended by up to 1000 people. He is also the chairman of satznachvorn e.V., which is committed to promoting art and culture in the field of literature and the performing arts.

Nina Willems
About

Nina Willems graduated in 2011 from the Maastricht Theater Academy. Since then she has been active as a theater maker in Limburg She also works as an art teacher at Hogeschool ZUYD. Nina Willems takes care of all financesfor Borderlines NL, as well as the programming of the performances during Borderlines. Nina is part of Stichting PANDA Collectief.

Merlijn Huntjens
About

Merlijn is a poet and, together with Nina Willems, (theater) maker at PANDA Collectief. from PANDA, Nina and Merlijn developed Borderlines: Euregion Poetry Slam in 2016. Merlijn is also a literature advisor at the Huis voor de Kunsten Limburg.

Merlijn appeared three times at the Dutch Poetry Slam Championship and at various festivals. In 2017 and 2018 he was the City Poet of Heerlen. Merlijn is part of Nina of Stichting PANDA Collectief and artist in residence at VIA ZUID and De Nieuwe Oost | Wintertuin.Merlijn HuntjensMerlijn_Huntjens