Building Beyond is a learning structure where artists come together with a group of peers to reflect on their practice, activate it within their local context, and collectively assemble ideas and universalities from across the continent - aimed at engaging with the built environment as an interpretive and alterable world. We support practices that engage with the relational worlds of communities and public space in this setting. We seek to foster conversations on how resilience, humanity, and creativity in our urban environments can create opportunities for communally imagined realities in the city.
The programme brings together 12 experienced creatives (± 7-15 years of relevant professional experience) working across diverse mediums, approaches, and interpretations of the mentorship’s overarching theme. Supported by four mentors, this Building Beyond cohort will come together over the course of a year to foster conversation, collaboration, and equal exchange; to support each participant in their own individual practice; and facilitate exchanges between the cohort, its growing network, and relevant external practitioners.
Eligibility Criteria
Eligibility
With this open call, Prince Claus Fund invites applications from individual, experienced artists and cultural practitioners who:
- Are from, live and work in our eligible countries: Algeria, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Egypt, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Uganda, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia, Tanzania, Tunisia, Chad, South Africa, or South-Sudan.
- Are artists, cultural practitioners, or creatives whose individual practice relates to architecture, design, spatial practice, public space, and urban communities. When referring to artists and cultural practitioners we mean people who have an individual artistic practice. We hold a broad definition of art and culture and appreciate interdisciplinary practices. Individuals who are arts managers, facilitators, academic researchers, or others, without an individual artistic practice, do not fall under this category, and as such are not eligible to apply.
- Have ±7-15 years of relevant professional experience. The Mentorship Award is meant only for individual artists who, regardless of age, meet the professional experience criteria, counting from the date they started engaging in professional artistic practice to the date of submitting their application.
Due to the nature of the mentorship programme, applicants need to be able to communicate in English.
Offered Benefits
The programme consists of peer group sessions, guest speaker sessions, and two in-person intensives in the form of ‘Lab Weeks’—one in the African continent, and one in the Netherlands—where there will be further opportunities for exchange and to build your network.
In addition to this, each participant receives an award of €10,000 and guidance from mentors to work on the concept for a body of work that is outlined in their application.
