Commissioned by the U.S. Department of State on the occasion of EXPO58, Brussels Loops is a fascinating collection of short films that depict fragments of the American Way of Life, during the historic space race that sealed the fate of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. The films were shot and edited by two great exponents of American independent cinema: Shirley Clarke and D.A. Pennebaker. Ricky Leacock and Wheaton Galentine also participated in the project, at the invitation of documentary filmmaker Willard Van Dyke. Clarke recounted in a 1983 interview: “We made about 30 loops […]. They told us the only subject we couldn’t cover was jazz. So I made them all jazzy. It became a game that Penny and I applied to both filming and editing”.