Runette Kruger is a research associate in the School of the Arts at the University of Pretoria. Her research addresses the underlying dynamics shaping our societies and the ways in which these manifest in visual culture and the visual arts. Her research focuses on notions of the Other, time/space philosophy, Afrofuturism, agency, and dissent – and utopias in which these are foregrounded. Her utopia, named distopia, is founded on difference and dissent.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Professional
Research Associate, School of the Arts, University of Pretoria, December 2025 – present.
Honorary Research Associate, Faculty of Arts and Design, Durban University of Technology, July 2024 – present.
Executive Dean, Faculty of Arts and Design, Durban University of Technology, 2021 – 2024.
Associate Professor, Department of Fine and Studio Arts, Faculty of Arts and Design, Tshwane University of Technology, 2018 – 2021.
Departmental Chair, Department of Fine and Studio Arts, Faculty of Arts and Design, Tshwane University of Technology, 2014 – 2021.
Engagement
Chair of Board, ASAI (Africa South Arts Initiative), November 2024 – present.
International Expert Panel, EVC (Exploring Visual Cultures), August 2022 – present.
National Vice-Chair, SANAVA (South African National Association for the Visual Arts), May 2016 – January 2025.
Editorial Board (Scientific Committee) Afrikaland Art and Design Journal. Launched November 2025.
DEFSA (Design Education Forum South Africa) 2025 Conference Editorial Committee, June 2025 – present.
DHET (Department of Higher Education SA) National Creative Outputs Review Panel in the Visual Arts, 2020 – 2024.
Research
Project Lead: (Un)told Stories: The known / unknown narratives of African Artefacts. Multi-institutional international research workgroup. Benin, Senegal, Ghana, Kenya, Germany.
Founding Member: CHA Africa – Comité d’Histoire de l’Art Africa / African Committee for Art History. Inaugural meeting – 8 April 2025, African Days of Art History Conference, Libre Académie des Beaux-Arts, Douala, Cameroon.
Books and Guest Editor
3rd Text Africa guest editor: Worlding: Time, space and newness. Publication 2026.
Kruger, R & Kriel, L (Eds.). 2025. Exploring art in response - Visual cultures and glocal concerns. Munster/New York: Waxmann.
Kriel, L, Kruger, R, van Haute, B, & Wagner, E (Eds.). 2025. Exploring art in collaboration - Visual cultures crossing borders. Munster/New York: Waxmann.
Chapters
Kruger, R. 2025. Stories of flowers and homesickness: Loss and militant melancholia at documenta 15. In: Kriel, L, Van Haute, B & Wagner, E (Eds.). Exploring documenta fifteen - Conversations between South and North. Münster/New York: Waxmann, 55-69.
Kruger, R. 2025. Gender Matters re/considered: Cross-cultural dialogue in the visual arts and arts education. In: Kruger, R & Kriel, L (Eds.). Exploring art in response - Visual cultures and glocal concerns. Münster/New York: Waxmann, 163-182.
Kruger, R. 2022. Post-Africanism as fluid, feminist and agentic alterity. In: Ekpo, D & Sidogi, P (Eds.). The De-Africanization of African art: Towards Post-African aesthetics. London: Routledge, 96-118.
Kruger, R. 2022. Strategies of co-liberation and belonging in the work of South African artists Titus Matiyane and Candice Breitz. In: Visual cultures of Africa, Kidenda, C, Kriel, L & Wagner, E (Eds.), Munster/New York: Waxmann, 195-201.
Kruger, R. 2019. Ruptures and continuities in the post-apartheid political and cultural landscape: a reading of South African monument culture. In: Macaluso, L (Ed.). Monument culture: International perspectives on the future of monuments in a changing world. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 85-97.
Journal articles
Kruger, R. 2026. When the revolution comes, tell them it was craft: A sociopolitical critique of AI. Image and Text – themed edition: The impact of AI on art and design.
Kruger, R. 2025. Rememory and métissage: two artistic departures from the present. Afrikaland Arts and Design, 1(0): 40-44.
Kruger, R. 2025. Decolonial worlding: sites of movement, marronage and fabulation. The South African Journal of Art History, 40(1): 50-65.
Kruger, R. 2025. The use of Al in arts education: A didactic tool for sensitising students and for the detection of technology assisted writing in the humanities. Journal of the Kenya National Commission for UNESCO, 5(2): 1-14. https://doi.org/10.62049/jkncu.v5i2.297.
Mol, C. & Kruger, R. 2021. The representation of violence in the Middle East: Diasporic Interventions in the work of Waafa Bilal, Tammam Azzam, and Reza Aramesh. de arte, 5(2-3): 52-74.
Conferences
Kruger, R. Decolonial worlding: cities of fabulation, maronage and mirage – SAJAH Annual Conference: Creative Intersections Art and Architecture. Tshwane University of Technology, Tshwane, South Africa, 18-19 July 2025.
Kruger, R. Panel member (online) – Session: Art, Culture, Education and Global Contemporaneity – an Exploring Visual Cultures Initiative, A Minor Cosmopolitan Intervention Conference. Institute for European Ethnology, Humboldt University of Berlin, 9 May 2025.
Kruger, R. (Un)told Stories of cultural heritage in Africa: museums and narratives – Inaugural Conference African Days of Art History / 1st Journees Africaines d’ Histoire de l’ Art Conference (JAHA). Libre Académie des Beaux-Arts, Douala, Cameroon, 6-8 April 2025.
Kruger, R. When the revolution comes, tell them it was craft: A sociopolitical critique of AI – 4th Annual Exploring Visual Cultures Conference: AI Media Innovations, Applications, Visual Culture, Challenges, and Future Trends. Technical University of Kenya, Nairobi, 27-29 November 2024.
Kruger, R. The use of AI in arts education: a didactic tool for sensitising students and for the detection of technology assisted writing in arts education – 4th Annual Exploring Visual Cultures Conference: AI Media Innovations, Applications, Visual Culture, Challenges, and Future Trends. Technical University of Kenya, Nairobi, 27-29 November 2024.
Kruger, R. Distopia: The politics of fantasy – 10th Annual Conference of the Gesellschaft für Fantastikforschung: The Romantic Fantastic. Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, 18-21 September 2019.
