Deadline: 22-Oct-2025
The Creative Industries Fund NL has announced an open call inviting designers, makers, spatial practitioners, and collectives to collaborate with partners in African countries on projects centered around contested geologies.
This open call aims to support transnational projects that, rooted in design practice, critically engage with the entangled (post)colonial legacies and contemporary planetary crises. From this starting point, these projects should contribute to research and discourses on environmental crises and/or current geopolitical and socio-economic tensions affecting human settlements and ecological systems. This open call specifically addresses contested geologies on the African continent. This is an open and inclusive call that welcomes a wide range of initiatives and perspectives. It encourages collaborative and transnational projects, the sharing and deepening of knowledge and the building of reciprocal networks. The aim of the call is to contribute to current discourses, designing and embracing approaches in spatial, design and digital practices that have the potential to inform and alter how they regard and engage with geologies.
The call is open to professional designers, architects, makers, thinkers, curators, researchers, collectives, platforms, or cultural organisations active in the fields of architecture, digital culture, and design. Applicants must be established in the Netherlands or territories within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, working in partnership with at least one collaborator based in an African country listed under the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation policy. Eligible collaborators include designers, cultural organisations, community representatives, social justice activists, and researchers across social, economic, political, cultural, and spatial fields.
Projects must demonstrate meaningful collaboration between Dutch and African partners, outlining reciprocal exchange and integration of perspectives from all sides. Proposals should clearly position themselves in relation to the theme, substantiate the proposed topic, and reflect on the local and regional contexts in which the project is situated. Eligible projects may take the form of artistic or design-based research, interventions, initiatives, or programmes, provided they maintain a strong link to the open call’s theme and design fields.
The open call operates through three distinct phases: research and exploration, implementation, and modes of engagement. In phase 1, applicants can receive up to €15,000 for a maximum three-month research and exploration period, with proposals due by 22 October 2025. Selected projects will present their findings during a Community of Practice meeting before moving into phase 2, where they may apply for implementation grants of up to €50,000, beginning in June 2026. Phase 3 will focus on embedding and sharing outcomes within relevant contexts at local, regional, or international levels.
Applications require a completed form, research plan, letters of intent from collaborators, CVs of applicants and partners, a balanced budget, and portfolio materials. Proposals will be reviewed by an independent advisory committee, which will evaluate artistic value, positioning, engagement potential, collaboration design, and feasibility.
For more information, visit Creative Industries Fund NL.
