Emmanuel Chisenga, a 24-year-old artist from Lusaka, has won an Ambassador Award at the 2026 Absa L'Atelier Art Competition, the first Zambian to take one of the continental competition's top prizes. Zambia Monitor reported the win on Monday 26 October; the winners were announced on a Saturday at the Absa L'Atelier Art and Lifestyle Fair at Waterfall City Park in South Africa, the weekend before the Sowetan's report of Tuesday 13 October.
Chisenga did not come to art through a school. Zambia Monitor quotes him: "I didn't follow a traditional path into the world of art by learning it in school." He is studying for a Bachelor of Business Administration and is the youngest of four children. The Sowetan reports that the five pieces he submitted were what remained after flooding destroyed his studio, and quotes him on the win: "This art is not much, but it's life changing." Being the first Zambian winner, he told the paper, is a huge responsibility, because people are now looking up to him.
This art is not much, but it's life changing.
— Emmanuel Chisenga, Absa L'Atelier Ambassador Award winner, as quoted by the Sowetan on 13 October
The competition and the prize
Absa L'Atelier was established in 1986 and runs in partnership with the South African National Association for the Visual Arts; this was its 40th year. Zambia Monitor reports that hundreds of eligible entries came from twelve Absa markets in Africa and were assessed by an independent panel, and that Chisenga's is the first nomination and the first win for Zambia since the group structure was introduced in 2019. The Ambassador Award, according to the Sowetan, brings a solo exhibition, R100,000 towards material costs, art masterclasses and a four-month mentorship with a leading visual-arts figure from the winner's country.
He shares the award with Reginald Boateng, 27, a Ghanaian photographer and environmental activist whose piece "Our Water Turns Red" addresses illegal gold mining, and Segun Owolabi, 27, a Nigerian painter who makes portraits in thread. The Gerard Sekoto Award, the top honour for a South African artist, went to Treasure Mlima, 27, a self-taught wood carver from Durban, and carries a three-month residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris from April to June 2027. Dr Paul Bayliss, Absa's senior specialist in art and museum curator, is quoted by Zambia Monitor as saying that "the calibre of talent in this year's competition was exceptional".
Neither report describes the medium or subject of Chisenga's winning work, and neither gives the date or venue of his solo exhibition.
Sources: Zambia Monitor, “Emmanuel Chisenga wins 2026 Absa L'Atelier award” (26 Oct 2026); Sowetan, “Reginald Boateng, Emmanuel Chisenga, Segun Owolabi and Treasure Mlima reshape modern art with bold vision” (13 Oct 2026).