Tiago Rodrigues

Tiago Rodrigues is the Portuguese playwright, director, and cultural operator shaping the frame around Han Kang's Avignon feature. After founding Mundo Perfeito with Magda Bizarro in 2003, he led Teatro Nacional Dona Maria II in Lisbon from 2015 to 2021 before stepping into the artistic directorship of Festival d'Avignon. That trajectory matters because it gives him both auteur credibility and institutional weight.

The Festival d'Avignon artist profile describes Rodrigues as a maker who combines real stories and fiction while writing with and for actors. It also traces his long relationship with the festival through Antoine et Cléopâtre in 2015, Sopro in 2017, La Cerisaie in 2021, and By heart plus Dans la mesure de l'impossible in 2023. That history explains why his endorsement of Korean as the 2026 guest language carries more force than a one-off programming slogan.

On HITKULTR, Rodrigues matters because he is one of the gatekeepers translating Korean literary and performance work into a major European festival context. When artists such as Han Kang and Koo Ja-ha move into that conversation, Rodrigues is part of the mechanism making the shift legible to an international stage audience.