The Fellowship program is dedicated primarily although not exclusively to individuals, collectives or organisations based in Palermo who may concretely benefit from a period of financial support to scale up their careers and/or develop new artistic or political projects.
Fellows conduct their work independently and are selected following an interview process aimed at defining their project. They are however invited to take up a role in the activities of Rizoma and will choose one of the ongoing Nodes to be associated with. Fellows additionally contribute to defining the long-term vision of Rizoma.
Two types of fellowships exist:
Individual Fellowships: Normally for a period of 6 months to one year. Individual fellows receive an allowance of €1,000 per month
Organisational Fellowships: These are grants offered to collectives, start-ups, or other organisations enabling them to upscale their work or develop a new initiative. These fellowships normally last a minimum of 1 year (renewable) and provide €10,000 / year in support.
Fellows are generally coopted and no open call is issued.
৺ ෴ ර ∇ ❃ ﹌﹌ is a feminist research group born in September 2020 in the virtual space between Palermo, Naples and Turin. Each person is somewhat connected to the South of Italy and came together with the necessity to discuss the intersection between feminism – both in its historicity and in more contemporary forms – and the Southern Question. The dialogical form as a collective practice of knowledge production and self-enquiry, starting from our own experiences and memories, is the methodological approach we share together, by looking at feminist self-awareness through a contemporary, critical lens.
Irene Coppola (Palermo, 1991). Artist based in Palermo and Milan member of the Room to Bloom platform. After completing her academic studies at NABA in Milan and the Willem De Kooning Academy in Rotterdam, she took part in national and international exhibitions and projects, including: AndAndAnd for Documenta13 in Kassel, the Do Disturb festival at Palais De Tokyo in Paris, Dolomiti Contemporanee in Pieve di Cadore, Flight Sketches at Cercle Cité in Luxembourg, Hanging Garden at the Office Project Room in Milan. In 2019 she won the 6th edition of the Italian Council for the art residency project La Wayaka Current Tropic 08°N based in the indigenous community of Guna Yala (Panama). In 2020 she won the Cantica21 grant promoted by MAECI and MiC.
Patrick Mudekereza is a writer and curator. He is the founder and artistic director of the Centre d’art Waza, a unique independent art centre in Lubumbashi. He co-founded and directed the first three editions of Rencontres Picha, Biennale de Lubumbashi (2008-2015). He participated in the foundation and sat on the board of the International Biennial Association. He curated exhibitions such as “Prise de Terre” (part of GEOgraphics, Bozar, 2010), “Close Openings/Vernissage Fugaces” (Various venues in Lubumbashi, 2011), “Mining Lubum” (VANSA, Johannesburg, 2015), “Silimuka” (part of the ChinAfrika under construction project, Museum für Gegenwartskunst GfZK Leipzig, 2017), “Aire d’oiseaux imaginaires” (Congo Biennale in Kinshasa, 2019, and Bogardenkapel Brugge, 2019). The project and accompanying publication “Revolution Room” (2013-2016) won the African Architecture Award in the Critical Dialogue category (Zeitz MOCAA, Cape Town, 2017). In 2016 he received the Congolese National Prize for Art and Culture and in 2017 the Medaille Art Lettre et Sciences. He teaches at the Universities of Lubumbashi and Witwatersrand.