Launched in August 2025, the Toyota Tsusho CFAO African Art Award offers five contemporary African artists the opportunity to deliver an international touring exhibition opportunity in Lomé, Tokyo and Paris, along with the production of a catalogue for each exhibition, and prize money. The Award is a new initiative to help nurture the next generation of African talent by Toyota Tsusho that has been active on the continent for over 170 years.

In 1922, the company started importing raw cotton from East Africa. By the 1960s, the company developed its exports of Toyota vehicles and other Japanese products across African markets. Over time, this long-standing presence helped establish a particularly strong business foundation in East and Southern Anglophone Africa, where the company’s activities became closely tied to regional trade, mobility, and industrial development.

The Selection Panel, made up of 35 art professionals active around the world participated as nominators through the global networks of Toyota Tsusho and CFAO. Following a rigorous screening process conducted by 10 jury members, including curator Ekow Eshun, Guillaume Désanges, president, curator and art critic of the Palais de Tokyo and Alicia Knock, head curator for contemporary art & research at the Centre Pompidou, five award recipients were named across five prizes categories: one Grand Prize, two Distinguished Awards, and two Sponsor Awards.

The first exhibition opened at the Palais de Lomé, Togo on June 11, 2026 and presents works by the five award recipients—Moffat Takadiwa (Grand Prize), Gosette Lubondo & Unathi Mkonto (Distinguished Awards) and Katlego C.L Twala & Tizta Berhanu (Sponsor Awards)—whose practices across various media examine contemporary transformations across the African continent and the world.

As contemporary African art is gaining increasing international recognition, The Toyota Tsusho CFAO African Art Award positions itself as a strategic artistic bridge between Africa, Japan and France, while bringing greater visibility to a new generation of African artists across different parts of the world. Sonia Lawson, Director of the Palais de Lomé, says: “Hosting the first exhibition in Lomé also affirms the role of African cultural institutions in major international artistic dialogues, and in bringing greater visibility to artists from the continent.”