African Culture Fund for Female Artists & Cultural Entrepreneurs 2022

The African Culture Fund is launching a call for applications, in partnership with the Institut Kôrè des Arts et Métiers (IKAM Ségou), with a view to selecting 16 female artists and cultural entrepreneurs from West Africa and Central Africa to take part in BOOT CAMP #3 scheduled in Ségou from March 2023.

Africa today is full of young artists and cultural entrepreneurs who evolve on the job, and very often in the informal sector. Among this batch, a large number is made up of women who find it even more difficult to make their voices heard on the continent.

The urgency today is to strengthen the leadership and empowerment of women in Africa, but also to create favorable conditions for their freedom of expression and their participation in public life. This will promote the emergence of women leaders and officials capable of claiming their rights. Women in leadership positions will thus become influencers and leaders of change in their respective societies.

For the emergence of our societies, we need to give women a voice to express themselves and assert themselves. It is in this logic that the African Culture Fund has chosen to launch the pan–African program LEWO (Leadership and Empowerment for Women), dedicated to the professionalization and capacity building of women artists and cultural entrepreneurs in Africa, with a view to strengthening their leadership and contributing to their empowerment, by providing them with the tools necessary for access to international markets.

LEWO is a continuation of the ACF ACADEMY program, launched in July 2021 and which has so far enabled the incubation and capacity building of 20 cultural managers from West Africa and 12 young visual artists from North Africa.

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African Culture Fund

Aim and Benefits of African Culture Fund

This third boot camp (training camp) of the ACF ACADEMY, will offer participants innovative educational content, coaching, and mentoring adapted and focused on specific leadership skills, during 2 weeks, in the creative city of Ségou (Mali).

In the program, there will be thematic workshops, practical case studies, and scenarios, but also one–to–one sessions with recognized African personalities in the field of culture and entrepreneurship.

This boot camp will provide young professional entrepreneurs in art and culture with tools and keys adapted to contribute to their empowerment.

At the end of the boot camp, the program will grant a scholarship of 2,000 euros to each of the winners and the monitoring of their development will be done for a year in the form of mentoring, provided by experienced professional men and women, great managers and leaders from all parts of Africa.

Requirements for African Culture Fund Qualification

Applicants must meet the following criteria:

• Be between 21 and 40 years old,
• Be a female artist (regardless of discipline) or entrepreneur with at least five years of experience, practicing and residing in Africa,
• Be a national of one of the West African or Central African countries (list below), Benin, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea–Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo. Angola, Cameroon, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Sao Tome and Principe, Chad.
• Be available from March 2023 to participate in the various LEWO Program training and networking activities.

Interview date, Process and Venue for African Culture Fund

The candidate selection procedure has five (05) steps:

1. Registration and filing of files
2. Administrative review of applications
3. Evaluation by the selection committee (Jury)
4. Approval of the list of candidates
5. Announcement of the list of successful candidates

Applications will be evaluated by an independent selection committee made up of experts and professionals working in the cultural sector and familiar with the artistic and cultural realities of West and Central Africa.

Application Deadline

How to Apply

Applicants are invited to send their file to the email address [email protected], no later than November 25, 2022.

The file must be written in one of the following languages: French, English

The file should include:

• Resume
• Copy of your identity document or other equivalent documents (indicating Surname and First name, Nationality, Date of Birth)
• Cover letter (350 words maximum)
• Brief presentation of the artistic approach (for artists) or biography (for entrepreneurs)
• Portfolio: presentation of works and/or photos of previous projects (12 pages maximum)

NB: Files submitted after the deadline or incomplete will not be accepted.

For more details, visit the website.