Listed as Mail and Guardian’s 200 Young South Africans making a significant impact in the Film and Media category, Mbali Mashaba is a South African Creative Researcher, Film Director and Film Curator. She completed an Honours degree in Film and Television studies at the University of the Witwatersrand and a film residency at Gothenburg University. She is passionate about storytelling, nuanced representations of African diasporic life and shaping stories around the complex lives of black women. Her passion for visual storytelling led her to creating the curation and production company, Behind Her Lens Visuals, and the annual short film festival, Reel to Reality Film Festival, as a home for African independent films.

​

She has experience as a student and independent film director, which has accumulated international film festival selections across 3 short films. Her film, Umlindelo, won the Best Short Film Award at the Mashariki Film Festival in Rwanda in 2024 and her most recent film, I Think I Should Say Something, received Honorable mention at The Absurd Film Festival monthly awards in 2025, and is premiering at Africa Rising International Film Festival.

​

Mbali has worked as a Creative Researcher for some of the biggest Television Commercial pitches, alongside multiple local and international directors for Commercials and digital campaigns ranging from automobile, sports, retail, beauty, travel and more. Some notable Commercials include the Loerie Award Gold Film:Online Above 30s Volkswagen SA “LETS GO”, Loerie Finalists KFC "DANGEROUSLY DISTRACTING", CORONATION "HAPPY TEARS", which she served as a junior Director on. 

​

As a film curator, she is devoted to amplifying African cinema through curation and under Behind Her Lens Visuals, she has showcased over 150 films to about 600 audiences, across 3 provinces. She was selected as a part of Scotland's Africa in Motion Emerging Curator Cohort in 2022, was a guest curator for The Independent Cinema Office (UK) Screening days: Young Audiences 2023 programme and was also selected as 1 of 8 film festival directors for Durban International Film Festival’s Film Festival residency in 2025.