Open Call Mentorship Building Beyond #4

9 April 2024

Our urban environments are more than just spaces for living. Existence in the city is formed by the intersection and interaction of people and objects, spaces and material, and personal and shared identities. The urban environment and its peripheries are in a constant process of (re)arrangement, movement, and negotiation - with many loops of access, boundary, causation, and opportunity. However, with increasing urbanization, cities are shifting in response to the high pressures of imposed modernization, changes in climate, and burgeoning populations with implications for ways of living together in city spaces. With this, there is a need for space to call into question what cities we are shaping and what we are losing in the cities that we build.

African cities, their peripheries, and their (sub)communities are continuously consolidating the material conditions of the physical city with the dynamics of the living city. As such, African cities are poised as places of fluidity and (re)configuration that move the built environment out of its perceived confines. They allow us to look at the constellations that our urban environments hold and as we move forward in our city-making they prompt us to ask: Who narrates? Who represents? Who creates? Who is invited? Who belongs?

open call

Are you an individual, experienced artist, cultural practitioner, or creative with 7-15 years of experience in architecture, design, spatial practice, public space, and urban communities? And are you living and working in one of our eligible countries? The Creative Industries Fund NL and The Prince Claus Fund invite you to apply to the Building Beyond Mentorship Programme. Kindly note that this is the last year in which Building Beyond will run, and we encourage you to apply to be a part of its final constellation.

how to apply?

Please check the Building Beyond Guidelines before applying. Applications can be completed via the Prince Claus Awards Platform. Only completed applications that are submitted via the platform before the deadline will be considered.

The deadline for the submission of applications is 14 May 2024 at 17.00 CEST.

programme

Building Beyond is a learning structure where you come together with a group of peers to reflect on your practice, activate it within your 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 relational worlds of communities and public space in this setting. We seek to foster conversation on how resilience, humanity, and creativity in our urban environments can create opportunities for communally imagined realities in the city.

Building Beyond brings together 12 experienced creatives working across diverse mediums, approaches, and interpretations of the mentorship’s overarching theme. Supported by four mentors, this cohort will come together over the course of a year to foster conversation, collaboration, and equal exchange within the cohort; to support each participant in their own individual practice; and to facilitate exchanges between the cohort, its growing network, and relevant external practitioners.

The programme consists of various online interactive formats, such as peer group sessions, and guest speaker sessions. We will also meet in person twice in the form of Lab Weeks, six-day intensive mentoring gatherings. One in the African continent, and one in the Netherlands. The programme carries two group projects for the cohort, namely: a public-facing event opportunity, and a collective publication. 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. While the grant is not limited to a strict project plan or budget, the participant’s proposed project will be used as a baseline for the programme and will orient the programme content.

about the Prince Claus Fund

The Prince Claus Fund has more than 25 years of experience in supporting cultural and artistic initiatives in challenging circumstances. The Fund's mission is to support, connect and celebrate cultural practitioners where culture is under pressure through a sequence of the Prince Claus Awards: Seed, Mentorship & Impact Awards. The Fund has been a successful actor and liaison in the arts and culture sectors globally, generating possibilities for critical discussion and boosting creative expression. Because of its track record and autonomy, the Fund is seen as a global leader in supporting independent cultural initiatives of the highest quality with a broad social impact.

about the Creative Industries Fund NL

The Creative Industries Fund NL is the Dutch cultural fund for design, architecture, digital culture and every imaginable crossover. The Fund supports remarkable and innovative projects, research and activities by designers, makers and cultural organizations in the creative industry. Through various schemes and open calls, the Fund’s Programme Internationalization of the Design Sector aims to promote international exchange and collaboration with the Dutch creative industry. One specific component is the international programme Inclusive Cities and Societies through Design, through which the Fund stimulates the contribution of design to the Sustainable Development Goals (11 and 16). For this programme component, the Fund focuses on (knowledge) exchange between the Dutch creative industry and African creative industries. The Building Beyond Mentorship and partnership with the Prins Claus Fonds are part of this programme.