Archives in motion, a D4D grant project led by Mandji in collaboration with Institut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire (IFAN), celebrated the 60th anniversary of the World Festival of Black Arts by training local youth to digitise archives and reinterpret them with artists. Together they build on a long history of African culture for generations to come.
Culture is a vector of connection and a vital element of diasporic identity, especially for young people. It creates a feeling of belonging to a community and to a country of heritage and/or origin. Yet, limited digitisation, or the conversion of physical documents into digital formats, continues to restrict access to culture.
This is where digitisation of arts and heritage comes in handy. It allows diaspora communities to reconnect with cultural memory across borders at their fingertips.
“We, as part of the diaspora, with all the difficulties we encounter abroad and with our children growing up, it’s very important that they have access to this because they’re caught between two worlds and may feel a bit lost… It’s a place where you can be brought back to your roots.”
– Nicole Letuppe, Project Coordinator, Mandji on “Yoor Yoor”, Senegalese Radio and Television (RTS)
A cultural world first
In April 1966, the first World Festival of Black Arts (FESMAN) took place in Dakar, Senegal. Described by then President of Senegal Léopold Sédar Senghor as “the elaboration of a new humanism which this time will include all of humanity on the whole of our planet earth”, the festival was a pivotal moment in the history and heritage of African art. It gathered thousands of artists, musicians, performers and writers from across Africa and its diaspora.
Yet, 60 years later, despite the significance of FESMAN for Senegal, the African continent and the diaspora, the vast archive of photographs, audio recordings and video reels in IFAN remains accessible to only a few, primarily through institutions beyond the continent.
An anniversary collaboration
Mandji, an African diaspora organisation in Brussels, together with IFAN, have been working together since 2025 on the D4D grant project Archives in motion: An artistic and digital odyssey to celebrate the 60th anniversary of FESMAN by breathing new life into the archives.
Archives in motion combines cultural heritage preservation with creating training opportunities for Senegalese youth in the cultural and digital sectors.
In October 2025, a call for youth who were interested in the one-month training on digitisation of archives was published. A total of 20 young participants, from secondary schools, higher education institutions, as well as jobseekers and freelancers, joined the training. Half were women, along with five additional IFAN staff members. They learned digitisation techniques and how to use different digital tools, strengthening their skills in the preservation and promotion of cultural heritage.
Thanks to the training, the participants have digitised 60% of the selected 200 pieces of analogue material from the 1966 FESMAN archives, ready for new generations to explore in person and online.
“We’d really like to put our knowledge to use so we can better help with archiving the data we have in the country, because Senegal is rich in archives, but not everything is digitised, so we could really help contribute our part to the effort.”
– Mouride, training participant
Since the FESMAN archiving campaign, four trainees have become official volunteers at IFAN, one has passed the entrance exam for the School of Librarians, Archivists, and Documentalists (EBAD), and another participant who is a fashion designer plans to integrate her newly-acquired digitisation skills into her artistic practice, while another has already applied the skills in her work at the Cinémathèque du Sénégal.
“It really helps us do our jobs well in the workplace, and we’ve been able to share so much with this wonderful group.”
– Suzanne, Cinémathèque du Sénégal
Reimagining archives through art
In March 2026, Mandji invited eight artists, including four from the diaspora, to use the FESMAN digitised files as source materials to create contemporary works. Through a ten-day residency the artists drew on the archives to co-create a musical and audiovisual performance and a visual exhibition, comprising ten individual artworks and one collective visual piece.
These contemporary artistic creations were accessed freely during the 60th anniversary celebration, Ndenc yuy dox. FESMAN 66: legacies, voices and perspectives of the present. The exhibition ran from 9-24 April 2026 at the Wallonia-Brussels General Delegation to Senegal together with the roundtable discussion “Archives, Diaspora, Heritage: Debates on Memory and the Challenges of Restitution” joined by researchers, academics and cultural actors and a musical and audiovisual performance “Archives in Resonance – FESMAN 1966” on 11 April 2026.
A living archive for future generations
Though culture is well-recognised for its value in identity and belonging, UNESCO estimates only 30% of African culture archives have been digitised. In an increasingly virtual world, the importance of preserving culture digitally is vital. Innovative partnerships such as the one between Mandji and IFAN can accelerate this process and ensure generations to come can explore their cultural origins wherever they are. As EUDiF has observed in research and partnerships on heritage tourism, digitalisation is a vector for change that can strengthen identity between diaspora and their countries of heritage, stimulate interest in history, and lay foundations for long-lasting contributions, including business and artistic ventures.
The archive digitisation training not only equipped youth with practical skills for workforce entry but also reinforced culture as an indispensable channel through which the diaspora remains engaged. By preserving and reinterpreting the 1966 FESMAN archives, young Senegalese and diaspora archivists and artists have created a living archive that enables Senegalese and diasporic communities alike to stay connected to their cultural history.