Arts Collaboratory is a platform for transnational exchange and cooperation made up of over 20 arts organizations from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. The mission of Arts Collaboratory is to promote collaborative, inventive, and open visual arts practices that are socially engaging and transformative.

Arts Collaboratory was co-initiated in 2007 by DOEN Foundation  and Hivos, two Dutch foundations, as a financial support structure and program of exchange for art initiatives in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. After the experience of the last seven years, Arts Collaboratory will now have an increased focus on socially innovative arts processes in which various methods and dilemmas around the role of art in social change are publicly shared and critically explored. Furthermore, Arts Collaboratory aspires to be a unique form of transnational network for art and organizational practices that experiment with different collaborative structures, and is committed to working closely with all the participating organizations. To help enact this process, we are pleased to welcome Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory, a Utrecht-based organization for artistic research and experimentation, as associate partner.

The diverse organizations of Arts Collaboratory develop a broad array of art projects that bring to the fore new approaches, thoughts, and realities in engaging with their respective local contexts, if not intervening in the status quo. They often bring together local artists and other heterogeneous groups to foster a cooperating community while endeavoring to connect it to an international context. Arts Collaboratory will be a platform where these communities meet, enabling the sharing of knowledge across regions, borders, and languages, based on a common ground consisting of an affirmative approach towards a more egalitarian, sustainable, and joyous world.

Participating organizations 2013–2015:

Ashkal Alwan Beirut, Lebanon
Al-Ma’mal Foundation for Contemporary Art Jerusalem, Palestine
Casa Tres Patios Medellín, Colombia
Cooperativa Cráter Invertido Mexico City
Creative Group 705 Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan
Doual’art Douala, Cameroon
Kër Thiossane Dakar, Senegal
Kiosko Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia
Lugar a Dudas Cali, Colombia
Nubuke Foundation Accra, Ghana
Platohedro Medellín, Colombia
Raw Material Company Dakar, Senegal
Riwaq Ramallah, Palestine
Ruangrupa Jakarta, Indonesia
Theertha Colombo, Sri Lanka
TEOR/éTica San Jose, Costa Rica
Visual Arts Network of South Africa (VANSA) Johannesburg, South Africa
PICHA  Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo

Opportunities for project support
While the participating organizations of Arts Collaboratory are provided financial support for a multi-year program and its process is closed, Arts Collaboratory continues to provide smaller financial support (max 15,000 euros) for individual projects by visual arts organizations in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East that stimulate social innovation. Projects should focus on research or development of new perspectives on specific social, cultural, economic, and/or climate issues, or the development of new forms of collaborations and co-creations. The granted organizations are invited to join the platform as associate participants. The current associate participants include 32º East Ugandan Arts Trust, Kampala, Uganda, Centre Soleil d’Afrique, Bamako, Mali, Darb 1718 Contemporary Art and Culture Center, Cairo, Egypt, KUNCI Cultural Studies Center, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, and Más Arte Más Acción, Chocó, Colombia.

For further information on the application procedure, please check on: www.artscollaboratory.org