LINES OF SURVIVAL: LIVING, ADAPTING, IMAGINING TOMORROW

Lines of Survival presents the winning and finalist work from the 2026 Africa Soft Power Climate Change Photo Essay Prize - five photo essays by photographers aged 18 to 30, selected from entries submitted across Africa and its diaspora. Across three editions, the programme has received more than 1,140 photographs from over 30 countries. The exhibition opens at The Africa Center on September 17, 2026 and remains on view throughout the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly and Climate Week NYC, when the world's attention turns to New York and to the decisions that will shape the next decade.

The 2026 cohort

• Mpumelelo Buthelezi (South Africa), Africa Soft Power Climate Storytelling Fellow, for E'Plazini: A Place to Call Home for Waste Collectors - the waste pickers of Dryhook informal settlement in Soweto, among an estimated 85,000 South Africans who make a living recovering and sorting what others discard.
• Kevin Ochieng Onyango (Kenya) for Climate Realities - communities in northern Kenya in the fourth year of a drought that has collapsed the distinction between wet season and dry.
• Brian Ongoro (Kenya) for When the Water Stays - families living with persistent flooding near Lake Victoria.
• Vanessa Mulondo (Uganda) for The Fishermen's Tale - the fishing communities of Lake Eyasi in Tanzania.
• Nicolas Vava (Togo) for Stand in the Sand - coastal erosion along the Togolese shoreline, where more than 60 percent of the population depends on coastal resources.

About the programme

The Africa Soft Power Climate Storytelling Fellowship & Photo Essay Prize is a platform for the next generation of African and diaspora climate storytellers, part of the Road to 100 Million Climate Soldiers in Africa initiative. New York opens an international exhibition tour that travels to COP31, to audiences across Africa and Europe, and culminates at the Africa Soft Power Summit in Nairobi in May 2027.

An Africa Soft Power exhibition, presented in New York in partnership with The Africa Center.