17/08/2026
The National Arts Festival's Artistic Director, Rucera Seethal, will be stepping down at the end of August to take up a new position. Rucera has served as the Festival's Artistic Director for seven editions, from 2020 to the present.
Rucera’s time at the Festival was marked by a period of transition as Covid, and the years post-Covid, significantly changed the arts landscape. The Festival’s programme has been consolidated and continues to be increasingly representative of multiple languages, storytelling forms and experimentation. Rucera has worked with the National Arts Festival’s Artistic Committee to steer work that explores the intersection of creativity and technology, the intersectionality of genres and broader International exchange.
After she leaves the National Arts Festival, Rucera will co-convene the Watch & Talk programme at Theatre Festival Basel before taking up a position with the Irish government, building a programme of creative exchange and collaboration between Ireland and Southern Africa in the coming years.
Rucera says, “It's been an absolute honour working with the Festival team, a group of people who bring everything they have and more, not only during Festival but every day, to keep the organisation and programme together and moving forward. When I joined the Festival, I came from previous work focusing on international and continental exchange. My tenure at the Festival has enabled a deeper engagement with the vast South African arts landscape, we have so much inspiration, hope, creative solutions to contribute to our fast evolving world. Wherever I am placed, I wish to continue contributing in this direction."
We'd like to sincerely thank Rucera for her deep dedication to the Festival over the years and wish her well in her new role. We're looking forward to our continued relationship with her as she takes on this exciting new work.
