Over 32000 Miles to Support 17 Artistic Projects’ Mobility Between 28 European Cities Within This Year’s Zad: Miles for Connection

Ettijahat—Independent Culture concludes the third and final cycle of this year’s Zad: Miles for Connection programme with the announcement of three new grantee partners. The jury selected three artistic projects to support this round that range from visual to performing arts. The artists will travel 4040 miles across Europe, presenting their work in new spaces and meeting audiences they have never met before.

Over three cycles in 2025, Zad has supported 17 artists and collectives traveling between 28 cities in 13 European countries to cover a total of 32540 miles of travel.

Zad is a support framework designed to promote mobility and communication for artists from the Arab region living in Europe. Its main objective is to develop their artistic and professional path. Additionally, Zad assists artists in reaching and engaging with different audiences, all while enhancing their contributions to public life within the cities and countries where they reside and work.

Zad continues to accept applications from artists throughout the year. The next application review date is on March 1, 2026. The jury committee will evaluate all applications received before these dates.

The names of the programme's jury members will be announced after the first round of Zad in 2026.

Supported Projects

Ahmad Baba – Lebanese multidisciplinary performance artist | 2240 miles between Berlin, Germany and Athens, Greece

Ahmad will be participating in a residency at Noucmas in Athens and performing Walls of Grief, an installation-performance exploring the embodiment of loss through architectural memory, treating walls as archives of grief and viewing architecture as vessels that hold inscriptions of trauma.

Lara Tabet – Lebanese trans-disciplinary artist | 1600 miles between Marseille, France and Berlin, Germany

Lara will be performing Resilience Overflow at Transmediale. The performance, based on the construction of a genetically modified bacterial strain that is isolated from the artist’s gut to incorporate and produce a gene linked to human resilience, becoming a microscopic drug producing factory.

Rania Mleihi – Syrian dramaturge, playwright, and director | 200 miles between Munich and Nuremberg, Germany

Rania will perform My Personal Ten Years: WE CAN DO IT! At the Nuremberg State Theatre. The project explores flight, exile, and new beginnings interweaving the artist’s biography with two historical events: Angela Merkel’s “Wir schaffen das” and the flight of dictator Bashar al-Assad.

For more information about the ZAD programme, click here. To read the frequently asked questions and view the application form, click here. You can also join the online Q&A session that will take place on February 9, 2026 at 3 pm CET by clicking here. During the session, we’ll respond to all your questions about the types of support offered and how to apply.

This edition of ZAD: Miles for Connection is launched with the support of the Allianz Foundation.