New international teaching fellowships

The Obel Award Teaching Fellowship programme has been established to enhance debate and learning around the themes defined each year for the OBEL AWARD.

Copenhagen, May 2, 2023

Obel Award Teaching Fellowship program has been established to enhance debate and learning around the themes defined each year for the OBEL AWARD.  The yearly focus reflects pressing issues for people and the planet while expressing the potential of architecture and design to positively impact our built environment.

“Education, now more than ever, is key to understanding the potential of the built environment”, says Martha Thorne, Senior Advisor to the Henrik F. Obel Foundation.  

The inaugural cycle of this new initiative centers on the themes of well-being in architecture (the focus of the Obel Award in 2019) and seminal ideas for cities (the focus of the 2021 award). 

For this first edition, three fellowships for up to 75.000€ each will be awarded, one each in Latin America, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa to benefit new, impactful university-level courses relating to cities and well-being in architecture.

Applications for fellowships are being accepted from May 1– August 1, 2023 and teaching is to begin during 2024.  The purpose of the fellowships – three designated for the inaugural cycle – one each in Latin America, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa – will support the teaching of subjects within official programs at the university level.  Illustrating a goal of bringing professionals and new voices into academia, Christen Obel, Chair of the Henrik F. Obel Foundation, stated, “the fellowship program is one more way to create positive impacts on the built environment through new ideas, new knowledge, and new pedagogies.  With the major societal challenges we are facing, education is more important than ever.” 

The themes — well-being in architecture and the resilient city — are purposefully broad to allow academic institutions to explore new ways of teaching and include new people within existing programs.  Like the Obel Award, the fellowship program rewards proposals that are ground-breaking and seek to lay the foundation for real change.  Knowledge is meant to be shared beyond borders and the curricula and experiences of the fellows will form a living archive.  

Applications, jointly submitted by the potential teaching fellow and host academic institution, will be accepted from May 1 through August 1, 2023. The application procedure is straight-forward and simple and requires both the institution and the potential faculty to collaborate.   With experts’ advice, the Foundation will select one application from each of the three regions for teaching that will begin in 2024.   

Contact information: fellowships@obelaward.org