Cultures of Resistance Award Recipients

Photo by Victor Dragonetti
The following is a complete list of Cultures of Resistance Awards recipients in text-only format:



Tobi Akinde: Akinde is a Nigerian filmmaker, film curator, and researcher with a keen interest in protest culture and the representation of the everyday as a way to balance out established stereotypes, speak to social justice, and deliberately document time. Some of his films include We are Tired (2020), a documentary on sexual violence, and Soja Go Soja Come (2021), a short film on the effects of COVID-19 on already precarious livelihoods and the staying power of the will to survive. His works have been screened at festivals, film clubs, cultural institutions, and community events. He co-curates Monangambee, a monthly Pan-African nomadic micro-cinema, and co-organizes weekly screenings at Thursday Film Series, a film club for students at the University of Ibadan to encourage political conversation. He has also curated films for the African Studies Book Club, University of Cambridge UK, and done work relating to film for universities in the United Kingdom, Canada, and Nigeria. He is using the award to purchase a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K to complete the filming of his documentary film project titled CAMP US.









Checkpoint 303: Using site recordings predominantly from Palestine and the Arab world, Checkpoint 303 constructs live soundscapes that weave cinematic audio with experimental sound processing and complex rhythms. Through its compositions, collected sounds, and noise, Checkpoint 303 spreads a message of peace and a call for respecting human rights. Contrasting with the mainstream media’s exclusive depiction of violence and suffering in the Middle East, Checkpoint 303’s sound collages report on the heroic hope that exists in the region, as well as the seemingly banal but ever so meaningful little things that embody a daily search for normality in a state of emergency. Checkpoint 303 is using the award to support its forthcoming EP, which celebrates the struggle of Black people and Palestinians, as well as the solidarity between the two movements, through electronic music, audio recycling, and collage.
Children’s Art Club: Children’s Art Club is a group organized for children in Malawi’s Dzaleka refugee camp, which houses about 40,000 refugees and asylum seekers—half of which are children—from countries including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Somalia, and Ethiopia. The questions behind the club’s founding were: Is a refugee here just to cry, to beg, and not be skilled? No. Why do we only assist on the weaknesses of refugees (giving food, medication, etc.) and forget about their strengths, their activities, and their talents? The club’s aims are educating children about the arts; improving and promoting their talent; letting them share skills and knowledge; preparing them to become educators and entertainers for other people; sharpening their knowledge and skills as actresses and actors of tomorrow; changing their difficult behaviors toward the community and families; involving unaccompanied minors in community service; building collaborations between separated children, orphans, and unaccompanied children with other people; developing self-reliance in children through the gift of the arts; promoting public speaking in children; helping them become tools of change in the community through the performing arts; and strengthening them as voices of the voiceless. The Children’s Art Club is using the award to purchase art supplies.









Fendika Cultural Center: A grassroots cultural organization in the center of Addis Ababa, Fendika Cultural Center’s mission is to celebrate and renew Ethiopia’s rich cultural heritage. Through the exchange of music, dance, art, and poetry, it meditates on humanity’s one-ness and works towards peace. The center’s vision is to nurture the creative community in Addis Ababa and grow into one of Africa’s most vibrant centers for artistic innovation and cultural exchange, grounded in rich Ethiopian heritage. Its values are creativity, peace, love, unity, and intergenerational connectivity. Its programming includes music, dance, visual art, poetry, and spoken word, as well as a community library focused on art and art history. The center is using the award to hire a media consultant to train staff members to make professional videos in order to film and broadcast live performances.


Ali Haj Suleiman: Haj Suleiman is a photojournalist in northwestern Syria. In 2017, he decided to join the ranks of media professionals who document the suffering of Syrians and humanitarian violations against civilians. He believes in the importance of the camera in conveying and alleviating people’s suffering. He has worked with Middle East Eye and many other foreign news websites. He is using the award to purchase press safety equipment, as well as for a project about people collecting unexploded ordinances and selling the scrap metal, turning a tool of destruction into a source of livelihood for a large number of people.


Aimé Césaire Ilboudo: Ilboudo is a reclaimed plastic artist from Burkina Faso who was featured in BURKINABÈ RISING: the art of resistance in Burkina Faso. He is part of AR-ECO-DE TILG-RE, an association of young volunteers from different socio-professional and cultural backgrounds. AR-ECO-DE TILG-REorganizes a cultural festival in Ouagadougou that works towards cultural, social, and humanitarian integration and aims to create and arouse interest in the protection of the environment in urban areas. The festival includes street art, mural art, workshops with resident artists, canvas creation and exhibitions, a large street parade with puppeteers and masks, and music. Ilboudo is using the award to support AR-ECO-DE TILG-RE.



Khaled Jarrar: With photographs, videos, installations, films, and performances that are focused on his native Palestine, multidisciplinary artist Khaled Jarrar explores the impact of modern-day power struggles on ordinary citizens while seeking to maximize the social potential of artistic interventions. Over the last decade, Jarrar has used the subject of Palestine, particularly the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, as a starting point for larger investigations of militarized societies, including the gendered spaces of violence and the links between economic and state powers that fuel and profit from war or political conflict. He is using the award to make a film called “Displaced in Heaven,” which follows a Syrian/Palestinian woman who immigrates from Nazareth in 1948 and ends up in the Yarmouk refugee camp in Syria.
Sultana Khaya: Khaya is a Saharawi human rights defender whose work focuses on promoting the right of self-determination for the Saharawi people and ending violence against Saharawi women through active participation in nonviolent efforts and demonstrations. She serves as the president of the Saharawi League for the Defense of Human Rights and the Protection of Western Sahara’s Natural Resources, and is a member of the Saharawi Commission against the Moroccan occupation (ISACOM). As an outspoken activist, she has been targeted by the occupying Moroccan forces while engaged in peaceful protests, enduring abductions, beatings, and having one eye gouged out.

JUMP – Jeunesse Unie pour un Mouvement Positif : JUMP is a collective that promotes art and culture as means of social cohesion and integration in Burkina Faso. It brings together young professionals from different sectors, including artists, makers, designers, and writers. Its main objective is to link creativity and awareness of issues around education, the environment, sustainability of urban life, social equality, peace, and stability. JUMP is using the award for its “Beyond One Step One Dream” project, which is a choreographic and audiovisual production. The project includes a series of residencies and creative laboratories for young artists with the goal of contributing to their professionalization in the fields of choreography, dramaturgy, audiovisual production, food and health, the environment, communication, and administration.





Ayesha Kazim: Kazim is a freelance photographer whose work includes portraiture, documentary, and editorial. Growing up, she lived and studied in fourteen countries. This experience, in addition to her multicultural background as a British Nigerian-South African living abroad, motivates her to use photography as a mechanism for storytelling in an effort to unite different communities through art. Through image-making, she aims to portray people of color in positions of strength and power, while also evoking a sense of vulnerability. She is using the award to support her ongoing series, “This Home of Ours.” The project serves to establish a contemporary time capsule of the Bo Kaap neighborhood’s rich history within Cape Town, South Africa. At a time when both an influx of foreign residents and the Covid-19 pandemic are endangering the livelihood of many residents, this series seeks to provide a platform of visibility that amplifies the voices of community members and chronicles their experiences for generations to come. She is also using the award to distribute resources to the Bo Kaap Cultural Hub and Bo Kaap Community Garden, two organizations she documented and worked with throughout the pandemic.
Belal Khaled: Khaled is a Palestinian Arabic calligrapher who uses an unconventional way of writing Arabic characters to converse with the world through the aesthetics of the ancient letters. His focus on the alignment of letters and the unity of their placement gives Arabic writing harmony and agility. He has participated in individual and group exhibitions around the world and been featured in local and international news outlets. He is using the award for mural and art projects in Gaza and Somalia.
Priscillia Kounkou-Hoveyda: Priscillia Kounkou-Hoveyda is a human rights jurist, writer, filmmaker and creative director and founder of the Collective for Black Iranians, a creative and critically-conscious initiative proposing an Iranian culture that stands fully at its Black and African intersections. Priscillia’s work with the Collective for Black Iranians is inspired by a childhood spent in Tehran, Isfahan and Shomal, searching for visual representations and narratives that reflected her Black, African and Iranian intersections. The Collective produces original content, ranging from short films to illustrations to photography.



Marta Lamovsek: Lamovsek is a Slovenian-born, Dubai-based photographer, visual artist, and creative director. She works with photography, art direction, installation, film, and collage to celebrate human vulnerability and seeks to capture the exuberance of street life in the Emirates. Her portfolio includes more than seventy titles, including VICE UK, British Vogue, i-D Magazine, The Guardian UK, and Le Monde France. She is using the award to support the production of her project “Sovereign Rebellion,” which will shine a light on change-makers, activists, and “noise makers” who stand for freedom of expression, truth, equality, and justice.
Le Jardin Jolof: Le Jardin Jolof is a visual artist from Senegal whose work features African masks, producing an aesthetic that mixes decoration, fashion, and cultural commentary. His photographed scenes involving masks celebrate and preserve African heritage while also confronting modern day social issues. As one example, his photo entitled “Arts and Plants” engages with ideas about the conservation of nature. His works also draw from historical references, while bringing in modern concerns and settings. Another of his photos is a tribute to the ancient Egyptian twin gods, “Shout” and “Tefnout,” who are depicted wearing Sarakhole masks.

César López: López was born in Colombia, a country that continues to overcome more than fifty years of war and social injustice. In the late 1970s, as a 6-year-old boy, he confronted the reality of Colombia’s civil conflict when his sister was arrested and tortured by members of the state forces. Their family was persecuted and lived through situations that gave rise to a special sensitivity to the pain of armed violence. From this experience and trying to make sense of his own suffering, César found his vocation in healing and accompanying the victims of Colombia’s infamous violence, corruption, and social exclusion. This pushed him to become a human rights activist and dedicate himself to touring the country permanently, seeing firsthand the harshness of the war. His work focuses on conflict zones with disruptive projects like “24-0,” a collective action for cultural change that he has carried out for ten years and that attempts, on the official day of “Nonviolence,” to reduce homicides in Colombia, as well as in several other Latin American countries. Every October 2, for twenty-four uninterrupted hours, his teams have managed to reduce the official figures of violent deaths through artistic interventions and social pedagogy. César was also the creator of the “immediate reaction artistic battalion,” a group of artists who react in moments of crisis by making an immediate presence with their music and rejecting violence in communities where minutes before an attack, bomb, or violating action occurred. He is using the award to support his National Hope Orchestra project. This is a branch of his Instruments Bank project and consists of a selection of musical groups around the country that are supported not only with instruments but also with accompaniment to make sure they have teachers and are able to achieve the Orchestra’s main goal: tending to the historic memory of Colombia through music.
Polen Ly: Ly is a Cambodian filmmaker whose narratives depict indigenous people struggling against commercial logging and hydropower dam construction. His films have won numerous awards and been selected to screen at both local and international film festivals. He is using the award to support his current projects: a short documentary called Cemetery of Green Souls, which won an honorable mention in the Tribeca Film Institute’s IF/Then Shorts Global Pitch competition, and his first featured documentary, The Tongue Of Water.
Lynor Mahase and Kutlane Sehloho: Mahase and Sehloho are owners of Backyard@Lynors, an artist space in Masero, Lesotho. With the award, Mahase and Sehloho are sorting out running water, working on enhancing the kitchen, and renovating the yard at Backyard@Lynors. The award is also helping them acquire masks, sanitizer, and gloves.





Nthabiseng Mohanela (TeReo): TeReo, who created the “From Trash to Treasure” project and works with the Morija Arts Centre in Morija, Lesotho, is using the award to repair the center’s car and purchase studio equipment to help with the organization’s e-learning program. The award is also allowing the center to buy external hard drives and fix an old laptop, which helps maximize production and effectiveness while creating e-learning content. Additionally, the award is serving as compensation to partner artists who helped the organization produce a music video for the Lesotho Film Festival. Click here to see a video!About the award, Mohanela says: “Thank you for this encouragement and boost. Our biggest challenge is mobility. We currently have a car that is broken and needs a new battery, and this money will assist with that, as we all know public transport can be very risky during the pandemic…. It can also help with food and transportation for our collaborating artists that join us in the studio. We are adhering to Covid-19 precautions and this award means we will be able to procure sanitizer and masks for our collaborators during recording sessions.”
Meshu Mokitimi: Mokitimi lives and works in Maseru, Lesotho. At 90 years old, he still spends each day in his studio dedicated to producing images that represent the culture of his country. He has been involved in politics in Lesotho and also travelled the world with his art, visiting Israel, India, Nepal, Italy, England, France, Nigeria, Brazil, the United States, and Ireland. In 1995, the National University awarded Mokitimi the Distinguished Service Award for Outstanding Contribution to Basotho Culture and in 2006, His Majesty King Letsie III appointed him to Commander of the Most Loyal Order of Ramatšeatsana “in recognition to his outstanding contribution to the promotion of arts and culture in Lesotho.”











Luke Rehmat: Rehmat (born Rustam Shah) is a member of the Kalasha tribe, an endangered Indigenous culture, language, and community living in the wilderness of the Hindu Kush Mountains in District Chitral near Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan. Rehmat is a social entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of the Kalash People’s Development Network, Kalasha Academy for Computer Sciences, and Ishpata News Network. He also works with a number of other national organizations in District Chitral. He is using the award to cover equipment costs for the production of “Dagiani,” a Kalasha historical short film.
Syed Mujtaba Rizvi: Rizvi is an artist from Srinagar, Kashmir. Painting is central to his practice, but his work spans installations, drawing, video, and digital media. Through his art, he seeks to investigate how mainstream narratives, personal memories, and social behavior are shaped by contemporary politics around geography, religion, culture, and identity, as well as by the universal preoccupation with death. Rizvi also founded Kashmir Art Quest, a contemporary arts organization that creates international artist projects and partnerships for artists in Kashmir. He is using the award to support his Redundant Conversations series, which uses ink, watercolor, charcoal, and acrylics.
RPPN Revecom: RPPN Revecom is a wildlife sanctuary that focuses on the treatment and rehabilitation of injured animals rescued from illegal traffickers. With jungle, natural wetlands, and a coastal region bordering the mighty Amazon River, RPPN Revecom’s forty-two acres contain trails, rope bridges, and wooden walkways. Pediatrician Dr. Paulo Roberto and his wife, Mrs. Marilene Amorim, started RPPN Revecom in 1997. RPPN Revecom is using the award to build an enclosure for a rescued Moorish Cat.
Minatu Saleh: Born in the Sahrawi refugee camps near Tindouf, Algeria, Saleh studied ecology and environment at Hasiba Ben Bouli University in Chlef, Algeria. After school, she returned to the camps, where she developed an affordable low-tech system to filter water from impurities. The system allows residents to restore enough water to reuse for watering plants. Her project, titled “Water, Lost and Found,” aims to bring real change on a critical issue to the Sahrawi people. Water scarcity is one of the biggest challenges to growing food in the desert, and “Water, Lost and Found” hopes to help enable growing food with filtered water. She is using the award to support the “Water, Lost and Found” project.
Jawad Sharif: Sharif, the cinematographer on K2 and the Invisible Footmen, is an award-winning filmmaker based in Pakistan, known for his signature visual storytelling style. He has an intuitive talent for revealing spontaneous human moments and is among the rare filmmakers who are proficient in weaving compelling visuals and narratives in both fiction and non-fiction films. He was awarded a scholarship to contribute to an International Film Exchange Program at the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television. Sharif is also an alumnus of the Swedish Institute and Institut Fur Auslandsbeziehunge, Germany. He is using the award to support his new film project, “Go To Hell.”

Keyvan Shovir: Shovir is an Iranian-American multidisciplinary artist and muralist born in Iran and currently based in California. He is one of the pioneers of Iranian street art in Tehran, focusing on and addressing social issues and political messages through Persian calligraphy and poetry. Through sculptural sound installations, murals, and paintings, he explores the poetic experience of the current political situation within narration and storytelling from the past and its juxtaposition with the present. All the narrations are rooted in his Iranian heritage through literature, history, Persian myth, language, and today’s pop culture. He is using the award to support his project “Messenger,” which is a sculptural installation created from skateboard decks, laser cut acrylic sheets, and chain. This piece is telling a story of an era in the late 90’s through 2009.
Andy Singer: Based in the United States, Singer has drawn cartoons and illustrations for over twenty-five years. His work appears mostly in the alternative press but occasionally in more mainstream venues. He has published cartoons in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, Discover Magazine, The Saint Paul Pioneer Press, Adbusters, New Internationalist, Z Magazine, The Progressive, Wired.com, NPR.com, NBCnews.com, and many other newspapers and websites. He is the author of four books and has contributed cartoons to hundreds of others. His first book, CARtoons (2001) has been translated into five languages. Over the years, the internet has driven many newspapers and magazines out of business, greatly reducing the market for cartoons. Today, Andy’s work appears in La Décroissance (France), Neweekly (China), and a handful of websites and small weekly or monthly papers. He is using the award to support the creation of longer multi-page comics, including a four-page comic version of the Woody Gutherie song “Ballad of Pretty Boy Floyd” and a multi-page comic using road-sign icons.

Mohamed Subahi: Subahi is a documentary filmmaker in Khartoum, Sudan. He studied in Sudan, worked closely with the Sudan Film Factory, and has attended trainings in Egypt, South Africa, India, and Germany. While concentrating on his own documentary work as a director, cinematographer, and editor, he also works with different Sudanese NGOs to advance topics surrounding education, as well as with big international institutions, including UNICEF, UNDP, IOM, Goethe Institute, British Council, and the EU delegation to Sudan. His first feature-length documentary is called “MADANIYA.” He is using the award for his documentary film series project, “Sudanawiya,” which takes viewers on a journey to all those cultural expressions and identities that are uniquely Sudanese. The award is supporting a workshop in Kadugli, Kordofan, for a group of local youth and artists on scriptwriting and filming, which will lead to two short films in the series.
Sudan Animal Rescue: Sudan Animal Rescue’s (SAR) mission is to rescue and care for neglected and destitute wild animals in Sudan, as well as to provide them with a safe and species-appropriate environment. SAR has closed down three zoos and rescued animals from private homes and parks. It strives to preserve and protect Sudan’s rich wildlife by educating the public and working with the local authorities to curb the illegal trade and poaching of wild animals. SAR is using the award to feed its animals, which include fifteen lions and six hyenas, and for construction costs for new enclosures to house rescued animals.


Abdulwahab Tahhan: Tahhan is a Syrian refugee based in the United Kingdom. In 2012, he worked with director iara lee on The Suffering Grasses, a documentary about the uprising in Syria. Since moving to the UK, he has worked as a freelance journalist focusing on migration and asylum-seekers and promoting ethical practices and inclusivity. On World Refugee Day 2020, he launched season one of his podcast, “Integrate That,” about refugees by refugees. The podcast allows refugees and asylum-seekers in Europe to tell their stories the way they see fit and to take control of their narratives. It also provides a platform for marginalized voices in the media. The podcast won two Lovie Awards for best feature episode out of Europe. He is using the award to support his podcast, “Integrate That.”

Tamada: Tamada is a new project from DJ/musician Lasha Chapel, a Georgian refugee from Abkhazia, that combines Georgian folk with electronic music. After ten years of playing rock ‘n’ roll, he turned to electronic music in 2015 and uses old forgotten instruments, harmonies, and rhythms, incorporating theatricality into his performances. Tamada touches on current social issues and romantic sentiments, mixing many musical directions—acoustic as well as electronic and traditional Georgian music—and has christened this distinctive new style “Deep Duqan.” The first album, Frühstück mit Tamada, was released in 2020, and he is using the award to complete his next album.
LeboThoka: Thoka is a Johannesburg-based photographer, image retoucher, and artist. Born and raised in Johannesburg, she studied visual communication and photography at the Open Window Institute. She has had multiple solo exhibitions with David Krut Gallary and featured in numerous local and international exhibitions. In 2018, she won a Loerie certificate award for Print and Design Crafts (photography) and she was shortlisted for the 2019 Contemporary African Photography Prize and the 2021 Royal Photographic Society International Photography Exhibition. She received the New Generation Prize of the PHMuseum Women Photographer’s Grant in 2020 and her work has been featured in publications including the Washington Post and the New York Times. Thoka’s work is mainly influenced by her feminist politics. She covers topics including femicide in South Africa and the nuanced experiences of navigating South Africa, and the world, as a Black woman. Her work largely uses repurposes objects to translate new meaning and narratives, with which she addresses social issues linked to navigating Black womanhood and the violence it faces within society. She is using the award to upgrade her equipment and fund a self-portrait photo series.
Gaafar Touffar: Gaafar Touffar is a prominent Arabic rap artist from Hermel, Lebanon. He performs across Lebanon and has released an album and numerous singles. He has collaborated with Osloob, Katibe 5, and other Palestinian, Lebanese, and Arab hip-hop artists in the Middle East to produce music and perform. He also works closely with young Lebanese, Palestinian, and Syrian artists. His lyrics focus on resistance, corrupt political systems, war tragedies, social and economic status, and daily personnel struggles. He is using the award to update his home studio.
Tuxamee: “Tuxamee” Irving de Jesús Segovia Pérez is a visual creator and cultural manager from Guanajuato, México. Tuxamee is interested in the study of textiles and clothing from a rural / urban perspective, as used in dance, traditional festivals and everyday life. This interest is woven into illustrations, collages and photographs. As a creator, Tuxamee has participated in exhibitions in Puebla, Mexico City, León, Los Angeles, Manchester and Athens.





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