UP Drama Department

23/10/2026

Congratulations to Drama’s postdoctoral fellow, Dr Stephanie Jenkins, on winning second place in the University of Pretoria’s DRI Postdoc Oral Competition. Her research, situated in the field of applied drama and theatre, focuses on creating participatory educational experiences centred on museum objects.

22/09/2026

Our "Art Activism" otherwise known as "Artivism" campaign is aimed at acknowledging and celebrating our students, faculty and alumni for their amazing Productions over the years. These productions are made to inspire social change, give the voiceless a voice and spread awareness of the injustices many people face silently in our societies.

Activism is all about taking action, there is no one way of expressing yourself as an activist, but this how our students, faculty and alumni express themselves in this never-ending battle for a free and peaceful world for all.

As the University of Pretoria faculty of Humanities SOA: Drama Department we will continue celebrating our students and faculty for expressing themselves through their art and getting us one step closer to a peaceful world, one show at time.

Thank you to everyone who has been supported us over the years.

14/09/2026

The Faculty of Humanities () School of the Arts: Drama Department is still accepting application until the 30th of September, Live auditions will be held late October.

Visit https://www.up.ac.za/online-application for more information

07/09/2026

Mirror | Mirror is a new theatre work conceived and created by Alan Parker, in

collaboration with a cast of student performers from the University of Pretoria’s

School of the Arts: Drama. Developed through a process of collective

experimentation, the production explores the unstable relationship between reality

and representation, asking what it means to live in a world in which images, stories

and performances do not simply reflect reality, but actively participate in producing it.

Taking the mirror as both a material object and a conceptual provocation, the work

moves between reflection and distortion, recognition and estrangement, the real and

the artificial. It considers the ways in which we encounter ourselves through

representations: in images, performances, screens, memories and in the eyes of

others. If theatre has often been understood as a mirror held up to life, Mirror | Mirror

asks what happens when the reflection becomes unreliable and begins to acquire a

life of its own.



Created at a moment in which the boundaries between the authentic and the

fabricated are increasingly uncertain, the production invites audiences to question

what they see, what they believe and how they distinguish between the thing itself

and its representation.

The production is directed by Alan Parker, assisted by Sazikazi Ndabula, with

scenography by Nadine Minnaar, costume design by Cindy Nhlangwini, and lighting

design by Oliver Hauser.





Mirror | Mirror will be presented at the Masker Theatre (University of Pretoria,

Hatfield campus) from 10-12 September.



Thursday 10 September, 19.00

Friday 11 September, 19.00

Saturday 12 September, 14.00



Tickets available here: https://tickets.tixsa.co.za/event/mirror-mirror

26/08/2026

We kick off 2027 with our Lessac Kinesensic bodyvoice training workshop!
Teachers, preachers, performers, pontificators, provocateurs - you are welcome!

Facilitating Lessac Kinesensics knowledge, explorations, and skill building through de-colonial practice. 3-WEEK TIERED PROGRAM University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa 8 January - 28 January 2023 Individual and Small Class Instruction. 135 total hours of intensive training. Certification tr

13/08/2026

REMNANTS is a new dance theatre work created for the 2026 GBV Symposium titled ‘Artivism: Resonant Voices’. The work is a collaboration between UP’s SOA Drama and TUT Dance Stream. The work asks what remains in the aftermath of GBV.

🎟️Bookings (Free entry)
https://forms.gle/xLgxdprw1bEjjsM89

📆 13 & 14 August 2026
🎪. The Masker Theatre, UP Hatfield Campus.
⏰ 18h00 sharp.

GBVFSymposium2026

03/08/2026

“Remnants” is a new dance theatre work created for the 2026 GBVF Symposium by Nicola Haskins and Marié-Heleen Coetzee.

The work explores what remains in the aftermath of gender-based violence. Using text and movement, the work enters the silence between what is seen and what is done, and asks how the aftermath of violence continues to be felt and witnessed in the aftermath of violence.
Developed through a collaboration between TUT Dance Stream and UP’s SOA:Drama, “Remnants” brings dance and drama students into a shared performance process that positions theatre as a space for testimony, critical reflection and collective accountability.

Free Entry

Bookings:
https://forms.gle/xLgxdprw1bEjjsM89

Set Design: Nadine Minnaar & Tharien Strydom
Costume design: Cindy Nhlangwini

21/05/2026

04/05/2026

You are invited to experience the museum theatre production 'Inherit(age)'!

📆 19-22 May 2026
⏰ Book your time-slot: https://forms.gle/vRnw2vJ2JoRWHnJq9
❗ Limited spaces available. Secure your spot ASAP ❗
📍 Old Arts Building, University of Pretoria Hatfield Campus
🎟 Free entry!
🅿 Parking is available on Hatfield Campus, Engineering 3 Parkade
⏳ Performance is about an hour long

The performance journey explores three of the galleries in the University of Pretoria Museums' Old Arts Building and the stories some of the displayed objects carry. The galleries include: Gallery 2-9 in which several Irma Stern artworks are displayed, including The Return of the Arab Priest; The Mapungubwe Gallery; and, Unclaying: South African Ceramics. Join as we journey through the museum exploring what heritage means to us personally and collectively.

04/05/2026

📆 8 May 2026
⏰ 16:00
📍 University of Pretoria, South Campus - Building 7
🎟️ https://tickets.tixsa.co.za/event/the-memories

‘The Memories’, directed by Kristina Johnstone and Lelia Bester, explores intimate and disjointed narratives of home, belonging, recovery and loss. The work originated as an artistic response to Cecil Skotnes’ painting “The Last Supper”. Through an embodied process of devising in response to the artwork, overarching themes of displacement, loss and redemption emerged that were woven into a loose narrative informed by current global events marked by the impacts of war, the plight of refugees and the politics of mobility.

‘The Memories’ was re-created as a full-length work for the Vrystaat Arts Festival in 2024. The current iteration of this work for the CASA symposium “Democratic Traumas; Democratic Desires” builds on the layers and residues of these past performances as we re-imagined the work in the desolate Building 7 on South Campus. The performance score is iterative, exploring exhaustion and repetition, and structured around affective and kinesthetic responses that become a pleading invocation of refuge, remembrance and hope.

Scenography: Nadine Minnaar
Wardrobe: Cindy Nhlangwini
Lighting: Phuti Matuba