Mohamed Sleiman Labat Mentorship Awards recipient

Mohamed Sleiman Labat is a visual artist, filmmaker, and writer, born and raised in the Sahrawi refugee camps in southwest Algeria. Mohamed’s work explores the multifaceted political, environmental, and social issues that affect his local community in the Hamada desert and the world at large. He is the founder and current manager of Motif Art Studio: a small, community art space constructed entirely from discarded materials, a response to the destructive floods that struck the camps in 2015. 

Mohamed has received numerous awards and his work has been exhibited internationally. He recently completed “PhosFATE”—created in collaboration with Pekka Niskanen and showcased at the Helsinki Biennial in 2023. The project focuses on the damage caused by phosphate, both as a substance and an industry, and its political implications, linking the Baltic and Sahara regions.