Library Of Africa and The African Diaspora (LOATAD), in collaboration with the Harambee Organisation of Black Unity (UK), invites applications from writers and visual artists across West Africa for a landmark creative residency: an 18-day, 3,000-kilometre journey from Accra to Banjul and back, starting in April 2026.
This is a radical act of listening, seeing, movement, and memory. Sixty-two years after Malcolm X stood in Accra calling for a global Black organisation, the organisers aim to retrace West Africa’s arteries—not as tourists, but as indigenous cultural cartographers. The residency precedes the Convention of Afrikan People (CAP26) in The Gambia, grounding its political vision in lived experience and creative reflection.
Selected residents will travel through Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, and Senegal, engaging with local histories, landscapes, and communities. Along the way, they will respond to curated prompts, gather stories, and produce creative work that will be shared in Banjul and later published in a Pan-African anthology and travelling exhibition.
Applicants (musicians and sound artists, visual artists and/or writers) must:
- Be based in and a citizen of a West African ECOWAS nation, including Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and available for the full residency period (18 days in April 2026)
- Demonstrate a strong creative portfolio and interest in cross-border engagement
- Be physically and medically able for overland travel across multiple borders
- Be open to collective reflection and public sharing of work
- Be over 21 years old
- Have a valid West African passport
The organisers will cover will cover transportation*, accommodation, border fees, insurance, and daily stipends. Residents must participate in pre-departure workshops and post-residency programming.
* Transportation for the full 3,000-kilometre journey from Accra to Banjul (5-21 April 2026) and the coverage of one-way flight for each resident, either to Ghana before the residency begins or from Banjul at the end of the residency.
