Four African projects selected by La Biennale di Venezia have been chosen for the 2026 Venice Gap-Financing Market, a three-day project financing programme.
By Adedamola Jones Adedayo
Four African projects selected by La Biennale di Venezia have been chosen for the 2026 Venice Gap-Financing Market, a three-day project financing programme taking place from 4th to 6th September 2026 during the 83rd Venice International Film Festival. The four titles are among 66 projects from around the world that are in the final stages of development and financing.
The African selections consist of three Moroccan projects (Don’t Let the Sun Go Up On Me, Stallions, Wolfmother) and one Kenyan title (Tithes & Offering). Together, they reflect a blend of documentary and feature projects from filmmakers whose previous works have gained international recognition.
Don’t Let the Sun Go Up On Me is the latest documentary from Moroccan filmmaker Asmae El Moudir, known for The Postcard (2020), which premiered at the 2021 International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, and The Mother of All Lies (2023), a feature documentary which won the Un Certain Regard Best Director award at the 76th Cannes Film Festival and was Morocco’s entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards. Her new project is a co-production between Morocco, Norway, France and Chile, produced by Insight Films, Haut et Court Doc, Quijote Films and Lofoten Film.
Also selected is Stallions, a Morocco-United States documentary by Rita Baghdadi, the Emmy Award-winning Moroccan-American filmmaker behind Sirens (2022), which premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Known for spearheading intimate character-driven documentaries, her filmography also includes City Rising (2018), winner of the Emmy Award for Best Social Issue Film, and Finding the Light (2024), a 2025 Cinema Eye Honours nominee. Baghdadi’s latest documentary project is backed by Lady & Bird Films.
Completing the Moroccan representation is Wolfmother, a Franco-Moroccan fiction feature by Ismaël El Iraki. El Iraki made his feature debut with Zanka Contact (2020), inspired by the 2015 Bataclan attacks in Paris, which premiered at the 77th Venice International Film Festival, where lead actress Khansa Batma won the Venice Orizzonti Award for Best Actress. His latest work is being developed with Special Touch Studios and Kasbah Films as associated production outfits.
The sole Kenyan selection, Tithes & Offering, is a fiction project from Tony Koros. Developed under the Biennale College Cinema programme, Tithes & Offering is one of three projects that progressed through the programme’s first development workshop and has since advanced to subsequent stages of development. The project is backed by We Are Not The Machine Ltd.
Overall, the 2026 Venice Gap-Financing Market features 36 feature-length fiction and documentary projects, 14 immersive projects, 11 Biennale College Cinema–Immersive projects, and three Biennale College Cinema projects. The market is often considered one of the global film industry’s leading co-production and financing events, which also serves the international immersive storytelling community.
This year’s Venice Gap-Financing Market will involve one-on-one meeting setups between teams (producer and director) of all 66 projects and represented industry stakeholders. Stakeholders include financiers, producers, distributors, sales agents, streamers, banks, post-production companies, as well as other relevant institutions and authorities.