What it Means to Belong by alej ez

Artists Open Houses Winter 2025 29 November – 14 December

Visit my open house Address: Flat 5, 16 Brunswick Square, Brighton, BN3 1EH

10:00 to 17:00

29 – 30 Nov 6 – 7 Dec 13 -14 Dec

Lately, my work has become more personal, more autobiographical. I stand behind the artist who visits places and meets people, and then reflects on these experiences to assess whether they have enough weight to become art prints — records of life. I position myself beside him to see how he works. What you see here is the result of this reasoning — questioning life, and the meaning and expression of belonging.

Belonging

We are all bound by connections — cultural, emotional, personal. When these connections shift or fade, our sense of belonging ripples outward, like circles on water.

To belong is tied to self-esteem, to feeling valued, to knowing our worth. It touches life and death, love and loss, and the cultures that shape and mirror us. Belonging is not threatened by difference, but strengthened by acceptance. It is about identity, attachment, and the spaces where we truly find — or lose — ourselves.

Artists Open Houses Festival

This will be the theme for the Winter 2025 Brighton Open Houses Festival. During its duration, I’ll be opening my flat to visitors to show my art prints — past and present.

Reflections and notes from a podcast by Annalisa Barbiery

What It Means To Belong with psychotherapist Mark Vahrmeyer

Notes

Last September on a short break to Seville to visit my parents I was listening to this podcast about what it means to long for coming home — that soft, gentle feeling of wanting to be seen, to be recognised, accepted. To feel you belong. That sense of safety, of being held somehow by a culture, by a community, by a place.

Often, you hear people say, “I’ve never really felt I belong anywhere.”
Because, yes — maybe we move between cultures, we adapt, we change languages — but sometimes it’s difficult to feel we truly belong anywhere.

And maybe through this not belonging, we also find something else — a kind of exotic belonging, you know? Like, we belong in-between. But that can be hard too. When you don’t feel you belong, life can feel heavy, difficult to live. I think about refugees, or people who live through very hard situations — and how important it is for them, for anyone, to feel they belong somewhere.

So the question is — how can we make people feel they belong?
Maybe we can start with curiosity — a gentle way of learning about each other. Maybe we can accept differences, not as barriers but as bridges.

For me, the feeling of belonging is like ripples in water.
It starts small — maybe with your family, or your close friends — and then it expands. Circles of place, of connection, of community, culture. Circles that grow with time. Circles of safety.

But belonging also connects to meaning, to purpose — to how confident we feel to express who we are, wherever we are. It can come from doing things together — joining a theatre group, a dance class, swimming, or a book club. When we connect, when we join in, something starts to grow inside — that feeling of, ah yes, maybe I belong here.

There’s also responsibility — towards the society, towards the community. Through our work, our contribution, we build self-esteem, we build connection.

Reflections

The podcast I was listening to is by Mark Palmer and Annalisa Barber, with Mark Vermeer, who lives here in Brighton.

And after listening, I started to think about my own ideas. Because I believe the sense of belonging changes through life. It’s not the same when you’re a toddler, when you’re a teenager, or when you’re an adult.

When you’re little, belonging means safety — being looked after.
As a teenager, you’re exploring, discovering the world, but you still have some protection behind you.
As an adult, you stand more on your own — you build your place, your role.
And when you grow older, you ask again — how do I fit now? where do I belong?

So, belonging — to a society, a culture, a family — it comes through contribution and integration. It’s about our well-being, about creating a legacy for now and for the future. It’s about feeling validated, welcomed, and safe — physically, mentally, economically.

When you come from another culture, you need to learn the local codes — the language, the gestures, the humour, the social etiquette, even the sports! These are all part of belonging. They are like oil in a machine — they make life move more smoothly.

And then, I was speaking with my sister, and she said something that really touched me. She said, “You need roots.”
Yes — roots. To be able to flourish and bloom.

Because your roots nourish you — your mind, your body, your spirit.
And from those roots, you can grow into someone who belongs — who contributes, who is part of society, who helps others to feel the same.

Conversation with a stranger on a plane

Above, I described how I was flying to Seville in September, listening to a podcast, when I started a conversation with my fellow passenger. I told her about the podcast, and in return, she shared her thoughts. She is an English teacher now living and working on the Isle of Wight. She’s originally from Kent but moved to Hong Kong, where she lived in a high-rise apartment. There, she never truly felt she belonged, though she was happy. Then Covid struck, and as politics became complicated, she felt somehow forced to move back.

Our conversation continued as we reflected on how her life experiences had made her a more accepting person, with a richer inner life—someone who had become a citizen of the world, where she now feels she belongs, and is very happy on the Isle of Wight.

Conversation with my sister in Seville

Once I landed in Seville, my sister Pilar picked me up at the airport. I told her about my thoughts and projects. Her reflections on belonging gave me a new insight into the concept. She has two lovely children and, last year, married her new husband. Her story of belonging related to her children, who had to grow up very young in the middle of a bitter divorce. My sister, always trying to see the positive side, told me how that experience—though hard at the time—taught them an early lesson in life: to be wiser in relationships and realistic, understanding that failure is a possibility and that happiness is something to be cherished.

Conversation with Becky and Judith at Brighton Seafront

I belong to a dance group with Martha Scott Dance. On Thursday mornings at 10:30, we gather outside the West Pier Centre on Brighton seafront to dance outdoors. Walking there one morning, I ran into Judith and Becky, and we started a conversation about belonging. Becky told me, with great pride, how dancing in the group gave her a strong and joyful sense of belonging. It was so lovely to hear, as I belong there too — and couldn’t feel happier.