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September Exhibitions Spotlight by Njabala Foundation

September Exhibitions Spotlight
Every September, we dedicate space to honor, archive, and amplify the work of women artists across Africa and the diaspora that have happened throughout the year. It's inspiring to witness the growing number of exhibitions showcasing the work of women and non-binary artists. While significant strides have been made, there is still much work to be done to create a truly equitable art world. In this newsletter, we are excited to highlight some of the most important art exhibitions that have captured our attention and celebrated the diverse voices and perspectives of women and non-binary artists in Africa and the diaspora.
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ANE 2026

ANE 2026 Meetup

Road to ANE 2026

Join us on the journey to the Annual Njabala Exhibition 2026. This page will evolve with new announcements, artist reveals, and program details as we build towards the main event.
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Njabala Anniversary

Anniversay

Sunday, 3rd August 2025

4 years of Impact

Four years of transforming lives, building communities, and creating lasting change. From exhibitions to mentorship, from festivals to community development - our journey continues to inspire.
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Symposium

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Friday, 27th June 2025

Mentorship Program for East African Curators

4:00 - 5:30 pm EAT

Join Njabala Foundation, ICI, and AWARE for a virtual public symposium featuring presentations by participants in the Mentorship Program for East African Curators. Over the past six months, the participants have been developing innovative curatorial and research projects with guidance from their mentors and input from their peers. This event marks the conclusion of the mentorship program, which has supported six emerging arts workers by creating a platform to develop their practice, gain resources, enhance research and discourse, and engage with established curators from East Africa and beyond. Offering opportunities to develop tools and actions to raise awareness about gender issues in the East African context, the program has uplifted a new generation of cultural workers sensitive to the place of women artists and augment the agency of female-identifying artists, curators, and educators in the region and globally. This symposium offers an opportunity to hear directly from the participants as they share the ideas and questions shaping their projects and broader practices. The presentations reflect a range of approaches and perspectives, rooted in the specific contexts in which the curators are working across East Africa.
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Lecture by N’Goné Fall

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Friday, 6th June 2025

5:00 pm EAT

N’Goné Fall is an independent curator and cultural policies specialist. She will be speaking about When things fall apart: critical voices from the radars a group show she curated in 2016.
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Kampala Calling: A dialogue between artists in Uganda and Australia

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Tuesday, 22nd April 2025

1:00 pm EAT

W.A.R. is partnering with the Njabala Foundation in Kampala, Uganda, to launch an artist exchange program, growing out of the NEST (Network for Empowerment, Solidarity and Transregionality) initiative led by AWARE in Paris. The exchange begins with an online meeting on Tuesday 22 April at 8pm, featuring Founding Director Martha Kazungu and artists from the Obulo Bwaffe Festival—a multidisciplinary celebration of feminist storytelling and cultural reclamation.
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This first conversation will introduce the Obulo Bwaffe Festival and create space for dialogue, virtual studio visits, and an exchange of ideas and experiences between
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Press Conference

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Thursday, 6th March 2025

We're excited to announce the Obulo Bwaffe press conference! Learn more about Obulo Bwaffe Festival from concept, to performers, speakers , artists, sponsors and partners. Join us on 6th March at 10:00 am at Alliance Français in Kampala. press conference RSVP link:here
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Winners Annual Njabala Foundation Open Call 2024

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Meet the Winners

In 2025/2026, Njabala Foundation will embark on an exciting new chapter, collaborating with a diverse group of artists to shape our programming. From the vibrant events of the Obulo Bwaffe Festival and the impactful Karibu Project to the ongoing research on Women Artists of the 1960s, the "Tuwaye", these exceptional artists will play a pivotal role in driving Njabala Foundation's mission forward.
Their contributions will be invaluable as we continue to empower women artists, foster cultural exchange, and contribute to a vibrant and inclusive arts scene in Uganda and beyond.
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Open Call: Ayeyi Virtual Workshop

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Deadline is Sunday, February 2 2025

Ayeyi explores community efforts within cultural integration and indigenous stories about women and the feminine. It involves collective stories and thoughts about femininity in African societies.
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Obulo Bwaffe Festival

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Friday, 7th March 2025 to Thursday, 13th March 2025

Taking place 7th - 13th March, the festival will include exhibitions, performances, talks, mentorship programmes, workshops, film screenings, book readings, poetry, round tables, speed meetings, talks, music, dance, among others. Featured exhibitions taking places in multiple venues across Kampala will last through the end of March.
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Paving the way: Women artists and Independence in Africa

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In March 2024 when we organized the Tracing a Decade Symposium in collaboration with AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, the acclaimed curator N’Goné Fall gave a keynote speech about women artists and independence in Africa. Paving the way: Women artists and Independence in Africa is now published.
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Njabala Foundation is elated to be part of the NEST project

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NEST: Network for Empowerment, Solidarity, and Transregionality is a project that will work towards building a network of independent structures working towards the inclusion of women* and non-binary artists in art historical narratives and dominant arts discourses. NEST is a project by AWARE:Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions
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Call for Volunteers

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At least 2 hours per week

Starting October 2024

Duty station: Hybrid

Email info@njabala.com to express interest and mention your preferred area(s).

At Njabala Foundation, we believe in the power of culture to shape societies. We welcome volunteer help in exchange for a few benefits such as networking opportunities, timely knowledge and access to paid opportunities within the organisation, growth and experience development among others.

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Annual call for Ugandan women artists

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Deadline: Thursday, 31st October 2024

2025-2026 programming

Requirements:

  • Artist portrait
  • Artist biography
  • Artist statement
  • Five to ten images of existing work, including copyright information, dimensions, medium and any other necessary metadata.

Please note that this call is open to Ugandan women artists at home and in the Diaspora.

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Mentorship Program for East African Curators

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Program Dates: January-June 2025

ICI, in partnership with Njabala Foundation and AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, is offering a 6-month mentorship program for emerging female-identifying curators based in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, themed “Curating as multiplying mediation and access to culture.”
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Njabala Talks

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Monday, 5th August 2024

2:00 PM

We have conceived a couple of products within the fundraiser that you are welcome to explore. The Njabala Talks enable you to know about Njabala Foundation work through a series of free virtual talks from August through September 2024. The first talk is scheduled for Monday, 5th August 2024, at 2:00 pm, featuring the dynamic Njabala Team. During this session, our team members will share their experiences, discuss the foundation's journey over the past three years, and outline our future goals and initiatives.
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Njabala Blossom Fundraiser

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Creating safe spaces for Women Artists to blossom

Your support is crucial. By joining us in this fundraiser, you help ensure the survival and growth of Njabala Foundation for the next five years and beyond. Together, we can make a lasting impact on the arts community.
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Pillars of Rectitude symposium

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Friday, 9th June 2023

Over the first half of the year, we have been reclaiming the work of women artists such as Kenyan playwright Rebeka Njau drawing connections between artistic practice in the 1960s and the contemporary moment. For the symposium, artists Charity Atukunda, Letaru Dralega, Liz Kobusinge, and Viola Nimuhamya delve into the practices of Betty Manyolo (1938 - 1999), Theresa Musoke, Rebeka Njau (b. 1932), and Rosemary Karuga (1928 - 2021).
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Annual call for Ugandan women artists for 2024 - 2025 programming

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Deadline: Tuesday, 31st October 2023

Programming could mean a wide spectrum of events and activities to be implemented through 2024 - 2025.

To give you an idea, previous successful candidates have participated in programming such as our Annual Njabala Exhibition which takes place every March (we launched this in 2022 - see links in bio to see past editions, and preparations for the 2023 edition are underway), other exhibitions abroad, residencies, research projects, mentorship programs etc.
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Winners Annual Njabala Foundation Open Call 2023

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Meet the Winners

Since 2021 we have been launching the Annual Open Call for Ugandan Women Artists to partner for the subsequent year programming.In October 2023 we received several applications from Ugandan women artists at various stages of their career and working across diverse media.Meet the multidisciplinary set of selected artists for the 2024 - 2025 programming. Projects emerging from the winners of the Annual Njabala Open Call will be relayed in our periodic newsletters and other information platforms in the months leading to the Annual Njabala Exhibition to be held in March 2025.
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Tracing a Decade: Women Artist of the 1960s in Africa

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Friday, 8th March 2024 to Saturday, 9th March 2024

At Makerere University(CTF building), Kampala, Uganda

Tracing a Decade: Women Artists of the 1960s in Africa focuses on the often-overlooked contributions of women artists during this pivotal decade across the African continent. The symposium illuminates the paths and works of women artists whose practice has been blurred for decades and whose contributions to early postcolonial narratives are yet to be recognized. Guided by a set of key questions, the researchers investigate the identities and stories of women artists from the 1960s, uncover the intricacies of their creative processes, and explore how they navigated the artistic landscape of the changing Africa. Additionally, the symposium examines the thematic concerns and reception of women artists’ work during a time of socio-political transformation.
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Annual Njabala Exhibition

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Friday, 8th March 2024 to Saturday, 23rd March 2024

At Makerere Art Gallery

Now in its third edition, the Annual Njabala Exhibition (ANE) 2024 titled Njabala: An elegy presents an emotionally stirring art exhibition dedicated to exploring the theme of grief through the artistic lens of women artists. Each artist will share her narrative, inviting visitors to engage with the universal emotions surrounding loss, healing and transformation. The ANE 2024 goes beyond mere artistic expression; it is a poignant invitation for attendees to embark on a collective journey of healing and connection.
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Karibu Project

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Karibu project is conceived as an alternative space to accommodate indigenous art forms such as crafts, folk songs, storytelling etc. Previously we have found the visual arts lens rather restrictive and often exclusive. Close/Karibu is the space inbetween, close to art but not quite, yet representative of many communities who have not necessarily tapped the visual arts.
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Open Call: Mentorship Program for East African Curators

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Deadline: Thursday, 15th August 2024

PROGRAM DATES: JANUARY-JUNE 2025

ICI, in partnership with Njabala Foundation and AWARE: Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, is offering a 6-month mentorship program for emerging female-identifying curators based in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, themed “Curating as multiplying mediation and access to culture.”
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Research project on Women artists from the 1960s

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Pillars of Rectitude (January - September 2023)

Introducing Phase one of our research project on Women artists from the 1960s.

The Pillars of Rectitude project aims to reclaim time for East African women artists whose work has undergone systematic erasure thereby inspiring the young generation of female East African artists. How can reclaiming the work of women artists such as Tanzanian artist Abubakar Fatma Abdullah and Kenyan playwright Rebeka Njau draw connections between discrimination against women in the 1960s and 2020s and open spaces to rethink forms of curation that will break a cycle of erasure and instead cherish and protect women artists' voices in contemporary East Africa?
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Virtual artist talk

Monday, 17th April 2023

Online

Virtual artist talk with Lilian Mary Nabulime & Martha Kazungu as discussant.

Joined by Martha Kazungu as a discussant, Lilian Mary Nabulime will give a virtual artist talk in an event organised by SOAS and the Almas Foundation. Nabulime, despite being one of Uganda’s greatest women sculptors, is hardly known on a global scale. She is a Senior Lecturer at Margaret Trowell School of Industrial and Fine Art at Makerere University, principally teaching Sculpture.
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Artist's walk and Exhibition walk about

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Njabala: Holding space!

An exhibition on rest, care & labour

Join us this Saturday for the exhibition walkabout of

The 2023 iteration titled Njabala: Holding Space is an exhibition about the efforts to rest and organize time in a world designed to constantly exploit women. Inspired by Njabala folklore's portrayal of Njabala as the “lazy girl”, the exhibition explores (mis)interpretations of rest, care and labor, especially in a Ugandan context. Ugandan artist Pamela Enyonu as well as the three artists who were accepted for the Annual Njabala Open Call of 2021 namely Birungi Kawooya, Mable Akeu and Pepita Biraaro have been reflecting on the themes through 2022 and have made new works for the exhibition.

The Annual Njabala Exhibition is Back!

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Wednesday, 8th March 2023

Njabala: Holding space!

An exhibition on rest, care & labour

The Annual Njabala Exhibition (ANE) is the main event on the Njabala Foundation’s calendar. Centered on and inspired by the Njabala folklore,ANE seeks to facilitate visibility for women artists through thematically curated exhibitions exclusively featuring women artists. The first iteration of ANE was held on 8th March 2022.
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Njabala Foundation is Hiring

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Deadline: Thursday, 17th February 2022

Terms & requirements

Start Date: March 1st 2023

Job Title: Programs Manager

Job duration: 12 months, with a possibility to extend

Working hours: Part time - 8 hours, 3 days a week

Location: Kampala, Uganda

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Winners Annual Njabala Foundation Open Call 2022

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January 2023

Announcing results from the 2022 Annual Njabala Foundation Open call for artists
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Phoebe Boswell

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November 2022

This November at Njabala Foundation, we are actively planning towards the Njabala Annual Exhibition of 2023. We are elated to announce that Phoebe Boswell is currently mentoring Ugandan artist Mable Akeu towards a body of work anticipated for the exhibition
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Njabala Artist in Residency

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Starting September 2022

Njabala Foundation is delighted to announce our first Artist Residency Programme where we welcomed Birungi Kawooya in Uganda for five months starting September 2022.

Birungi’s ongoing residency has been tailored to provide for her specific needs as a Ugandan - British artist with the urge to indulge with her own roots and culture. By living in Uganda for about 5 months, at her studio at Afroposcene space, with the support of five mentors, she is looking to develop her storytelling whilst learning to use ensansa (palm leaves), lubogo (Bark cloth), Kiganda dance, ebyaayi (banana fibre) and sewing in her artwork.
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Annual Call for Ugandan Women Artists

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Deadline: Sunday, 30th October 2022

Its October, the time of the year when we send out our annual call for women artists ahead of our 2023 - 2024 programming. Following our open call in October 2021, in which three Ugandan women artists namely Pepita Biraaro, Mable Akeu and Birungi Kawooya emerged successful, we are launching the annual call for Ugandan women artists until the end of October 2022.
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We got featured!

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Njabala the Ugandan myth to facilitate conversations on womanhood

In the week of 8th March 2022, when we launched the Njabala Foundation in Kampala with a magnificent exhibition at Makerere Art Gallery, our founder was interviewed by Fari Sow of Moleskine Foundation about the mission and relevance of Njabala Foundation and its projects.
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Empowerment Exhibition

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Saturday, 10th September 2022 to Sunday, 8th January 2023

Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg

Yes, we want all people to have the same rights and opportunities! Yes, we want to use art to raise awareness and to enable sustainable and effective encounters! Yes, we want to contribute to equality and to encourage and empower people who are marginalized or affected by discrimination. And yes, the world would be a better place if we were all feminists: „We Should All Be Feminists!“ (C. N. Adichie). The exhibition Empowerment brings together diverse feminist approaches and understands these as a progressive methods to analyze the societies of the world with the means of art and to show possible ways out of the global crises. For the first time, around 100 artistic positions offer a comprehensive global overview of art and feminisms of the 21st century - from around 50 countries from all continents.
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Dancing with Winnowers, 2022

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Saturday, 10th September 2022 to Sunday, 8th January 2023

At the bottom of the world’s social hierarchy is the black woman. While universally seen as ‘strong and enduring’, she is truly the most vulnerable and unprotected of all women. She has been forced to bear innumerable burdens in a way that continues to be profoundly culturally toxic and abusive to her psyche. Pamela Enyonu seeks to reclaim the woman’s story from the invisible hands that write, rejecting the prevailing narratives and fictionalized, fetishized versions of women and give lead to more powerful versions of womanhood.
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Announcement of successful participants and inaugural lecture

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Virtual Artists’ Residency in collaboration with Njabala Foundation and Black Art Brazil

Having announced the successful applicants to the virtual residency, we are happy to commence the residency programme this September. The inaugural lectures will take place on 6th September at 7pm Brazil time with two American Professors:
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Njabala invited to Documenta Off in Kassel

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Saturday, 10th September 2022 to Sunday, 8th January 2023

At least two artists will be exhibited in an exhibition conceived by Njabala Foundation on invitation by Moving School in Kassel. Njabala foundation would like to propose an artistic production and exhibition featuring two artists’ works - Samba Gown by Sandra Suubi and Little Black Dress short film by Esteri Tebandeke.
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FLOWS (IN)FLOW: TRANSITORY

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Virtual Artists’ Residency in collaboration with Njabala Foundation and Black Art Brazil

On invitation by Independent Curator, Historian and Museologist Patrícia Brito, Njabala Foundation is pleased to announce a collaboration with Black Art Brazil on their second Virtual Artists’ Residency.
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Curatorial Intensive Public Symposium

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Thursday, 18th August 2022

Uganda Museum Auditorium - Free entrance

Join us in person from 2-6pm on August 18 for the Curatorial Intensive in Kampala Public Symposium. The Intensive participants – 13 international emerging curators – will present the exhibition and project proposals they have developed throughout the course of the eight-day professional development program.
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Njabala in Antwerp - Unsettled Exhibition by Duende Art Projects

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Njabala Foundation is pleased to announce a prestigious collaboration with Belgium based gallery called Duende Art Projects to showcase the work of Lilian Nabulime in the Unsettled exhibition which opened within the Antwarp art weekend. Unsettled” is an ode to restlessness.
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Iraa-the Granary by Immy Mali

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Tuesday, 8th March 2022

The session will take place on the morning of 8.03.2022 as a precursor event to other programming around the exhibition opening of the show Njabala-This is not how which will happen later in the day.
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Njabala: This Is Not How exhibition

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Tuesday, 8th March 2022

The Njabala Foundation is pleased to announce a series of events taking place on 8th March 2022 to mark the foundation launch at Makerere Art Gallery.
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Echo minds poets

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Citing the International Women’s Day theme this year #BreakTheBias, Echo minds poets will join the rest of the world in a poetic show to redefine themselves and change the narrative.
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Archive Reads: The Scar by Rebecca Njau

Archive reading with Beatrice Wanjiku and Martha Kazungu reminiscing on Mariana's voice in The Scar, a play written by Rebecca Njau in the early 1960s and published in the Transition Magazine in March 1963.
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Be AWARE: A history of women artists

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Njabala was featured in A history of women artists which took place at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris in partnership with the Forum Generation Equality.
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Reclaim: Narratives of african women artists symposium

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Martha Kazungu presented a paper on the Njabala project in Reclaim:Narratives of African women Artists symposium.
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