Call for applications: Prince Claus Fund Building Beyond Mentorship programme 2023

The call is designed for mid-career artists, designers or creatives with five to 10 years of experience in architecture, design, or spatial practice, whose work is dedicated to (re)imaging the future of your African city.

Building Beyond brings together 12 experienced creatives, artists and designers over the course of a year to foster conversation, collaboration, and exchange within the cohort, to support each participant in their own individual practice, and to facilitate exchanges between the cohort and relevant external practitioners.

Building Beyond is an alternative educational structure where participants come together with their peers to reflect on their practice, activate their practice within their local context, and gather ideas and universalities from different urban contexts – aimed at reimagining the future of your contexts and continent.

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 (about $11 000) and guidance from mentors to work on the concept for a body of work that is outlined in their application.

There is a need to engage in critical questioning, to consider how we live, and what the future could hold. What are the processes that define our shared spaces, what are the forms through which they should be pursued, and who will participate in shaping them?

How to apply?

• Interested creatives should first create a Prince Claus Awards Platform account here and apply before 15 June.
• Applicants should first check the Eligibility Criteria & Guidelines before applying  and check out the Frequently Asked Questions for more information. Applications can be completed via the Prince Claus Awards Platform.

The call is open to creatives living and working in 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, and South-Sudan.

“We invite you to apply to the Building Beyond Mentorship Programme and define the future of public space and community in your city by activating the imagined possibilities of your localised context,” the statement reads. “We support practices that engage with challenges related to your city’s public space and communities to propose alternative ideas and methods that align the physical city with the realities and imaginations of the lived city. We seek to foster locally-rooted, critical design practices, and cultural productions that challenge our ideas of space and citizenship, reaffirm agency, and restate ownership.

“Our cities are more than just spaces for living and working. They hold communities, expressions, knowledge systems, economies, beliefs, and they are crucial spaces for identity formation that shapes our lives. Globally, the pressure on cities is growing exponentially, particularly on the African continent.”

View the original call here.