EAF Welcomes New Trustees to the Board ahead of 2024 festival

EAF (Edinburgh Art Festival) welcomes five new Trustees to the Board ahead of a packed 20th Birthday programme taking place from 9 – 25 August 2024.


As we prepare to invite audiences to join us in a moment to collectively pause and reflect upon the conditions under which we live, work, gather and resist through our programme this August, newly appointed Trustees will join the existing Board. Joining Chair Gemma Cairney, Co-Chair Beth Bate and Trustees Lucy Askew, Sheila Irvine and Rachel Maclean are writer, facilitator and radical Jj Fadaka; artist, poet and author Tanatsei Gambura; London Gallery Weekend Managing Director Emily Lennox; communications director Rachel Mapplebeck and Design Museum Head of Philanthropy Rosheen Murray.

Jj Fadaka. Photo by Matthew Arthur Williams.

Jj Fadaka is a writer, facilitator and radical based in Edinburgh. Their writing explores the possibility abolition, feminism, and love give us to create change. In workshops, Jj draws on afro-futuristic radical traditions to create space for exploring desire in a world without barriers. Jj organises events for political education and finding belonging with music, visual arts and performance. 

Tanatsei Gambura. Photo credit: Ellie Morag.

Tanatsei Gambura is an artist, poet, and the author of Things I Have Forgotten Before (Bad Betty Press, 2021). Based in Edinburgh, she works primarily across sound and installation, situating her work within public relational contexts. Having lived and worked in Los Angeles, her work has had an international audience, with exhibitions reaching Berlin, Accra, and Jeju. Outside the studio, Tanatsei is an investment professional who spends her time studying where and how capital is deployed in the machinery of the modern world.

Emily Lennox. Photo Credit: Nabeel Khan.

Emily Lennox is Managing Director of London Gallery Weekend; the largest annual gallery weekend event in Europe. Emily has held senior operational roles in the commercial sector of the art world for 18 years. During this time, she has directed artist studios and operations at galleries including Haunch of Venison, Sadie Coles HQ, and Unit London. Emily was the head of the London studios for Damien Hirst and Royal Academician Yinka Shonibare CBE.

Rachel Mapplebeck. Photo Credit: David Levene

Rachel Mapplebeck is a highly experienced director of communications and marketing who puts audiences at the centre, and builds brand and profile for arts organisations. Rachel has been part of the Senior Management teams at Art Fund and the Whitechapel Gallery. Currently, Rachel provides strategic support and advice to a range of cultural clients including: the Mayor of London’s Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm programme including the forthcoming HIV/AIDS and transatlantic slave trade memorials; Waterloo and South Bank Net Zero 2030; arts organisations and individuals; and working in collaboration on projects with Cultural Associates Oxford and Flint Culture. Rachel is also on the boards of Harewood House Trust and Gasworks Gallery.

Rosheen Murray. Photo Credit: Rachel Orphan

Rosheen Murray has over ten years of experience of fundraising in the culture sector. Currently Head of Philanthropy at the Design Museum in London, she previously held posts at the National Galleries of Scotland and Edinburgh Art Festival. She holds a Diploma from the Chartered Institute of Fundraising and has previously been Trustee and Treasurer of Rhubaba Gallery and Studios.

The new Trustees join the Board at an exciting time, with EAF’s August 2024 programme just months away. We will use the opportunity of our 20th Birthday to connect with historic and contemporary ways of organising that have built infrastructures of care and pioneering activist movements over the past 20 years (and beyond).

Find out more about our 20th Birthday programme.

Contact us

For all media enquiries please contact Nicola Jeffs: [email protected] 

Further Information

EAF (Edinburgh Art Festival) is the UK’s largest annual festival of visual art. Founded in 2004, we cultivate connections between artists, collaborators and communities to develop contemporary visual art projects in Edinburgh. In August, we present the UK’s largest annual visual art festival that is deeply rooted in the city and Scotland, with a global dialogue and connection. We amplify intersectional voices and perspectives. 2024 is EAF’s 20th birthday.

The festival is the moment once a year where we make public and bring together in a live moment all of the relationships and support structures that we embody. Since 2004, we have presented 19 editions, working with an average of 35 partner galleries and venues every year. We have programmed 685 events, in addition to the hundreds of other events presented by our partners. Since 2011, we have welcomed a total of over 2.5 million visitors to EAF. EAF is Directed by Kim McAleese. 

Our public funders are: Creative Scotland, the public body that supports the arts, screen and creative industries across all parts of Scotland distributing funding provided by the Scottish Government and The National Lottery. Further information at creativescotland.com. We are also supported by City of Edinburgh Council.

Our major programme supporters are: the PLACE Programme, a partnership between Edinburgh Festivals, Scottish Government, City of Edinburgh Council and Creative Scotland; and Event Scotland.