While the abundance of Copperbelt studies, produced over a period of some 75 years, has covered many aspects of economic, political and social life, the area of cultural production has been the object of comparatively little analysis. Yet, the Copperbelt’s urban and heteroclite communities have, throughout their history, been important producers of cultural outputs. The last decades of the twentieth century were a period of profound sociological, political and economic change for the population of the Copperbelt, both in Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The gradual, but spectacular, collapse of the copper industry coincided with the growth of distinctive, and often politically engaged, artistic genres. Particularly noteworthy examples are the development of ‘Zamrock’ music, whose popularity has risen and fallen in tandem with Zambia’s economic success, and the ‘Katanga genre painting’, which enabled artists such as Tshibumba Kanda Matulu to sell paintings depicting key historical events to urban Congolese consumers. These and more everyday forms of cultural production – such as radio programmes, popular theatre or comics – offered Copperbelt residents a channel through which to articulate the meaning of the historical change they experienced. In addition, in a context in which cross-border links became crucial for economic survival, everyday forms of cultural production offer the possibility to explore the ways in which the experience of change was shared across the border. By exploring the ways in which processes of historical change found expression in everyday life on both sides of the border, this paper will aim to integrate analysis of transnational cultural exchange into the post-colonial history of the region.