We invited Marc from Audiovisual Unit to tell us more about his background, what are his tasks, duties, future projects and personal goals, hobbies.

I'm a Belgian, born from Dutch parents. They decided, when I was born, to speak French. This is why I know both languages, let's say : I'm a « real » Belgian. thanks to my parents.

When I was 18, I wanted to be a sound engineer. My project was to work for the National Radio RTBF or VRT. Though we had a great many classes at school, so  I had to succeed in a test to be accepted as a student to become a sound engineer. But I failed, and I made studies of electronics. I didn't like it, but it still helps me in every single technical situation of my life.

I never have worked in electronics. I immediatly started working at the RTBF.

I have worked for RTBF during more than twenty years, and I loved it. There I did several jobs but a few years ago, I needed to find an other place where the mix between politics and medias could bring more possibilities.

Here my searches outside of the RTBF began…. A former colleague of mine was working at the European Parliament.

One day I received  a call….. And step by step, this is how I moved to the EP.

When I just arrived, I worked as a sound engineer in the radio studios.

But after a while, my colleague and I began to prepare a multimedia project called Voxbox. And it worked out!

Now I'm in charge of all of this. We are recording lots of things for radios and MEP's.

The Voxbox is a part of the Audiovisual unit :  the project of the AV unit is that we should help Radio stations, Television Broadcasters, and MEP's  to make the EP better known and understood. After a while I realised that this was exactly the field, that I found myself in and was searching for a long time.

Personally,  the most important thing for me is not the job you do but how you do it. The main point is the quality of the relations you can have with the persons you work with. This is what I like with the Voxbox project. It works that way!

What is strange when you work in this world, is that sometimes it looks really virtual : some things are recorded that you never will see afterwards.But some time ago, I was asked to give a hand to facilitate a phone connection with Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian journalist, at the Bozar in Brussels for the Sakharov Prize.

I fixed the thing and called the lady and talked to her, she was in her country. After the event, she was arrested. So at the end-not that virtual at all….

My free time is dedicated to my family and to music. I play several instruments : fretless bass, double bass, cello, piano and guitar.

I play music with some people and I love it. I play in one music band, where we launch concerts from time to time all over Belgium.

But my personal dream is to make a project of my own, composing arranging and playing it with a band. Unfortunately, this takes a lot of time…So…we'll see.

Thanks Marc!