About
Lara van Huyssteen is a South African writer, theatre maker and performer in London, UK and Cape Town, ZA.
Lara van Huyssteen is a multi-talented artist whose work in theatre and performance has been recognised by critics, the UK’s OffFest Awards and multiple media outlets, including Woman&Home ZA. She creates work as a solo artist and as a collaborator with her company, Et al.
She premiered her solo performance That Boy Has No Shoes, a personal perspective on the history of Apartheid, at Camden People’s Theatre in London as part of Camden Fringe 2024. The performance garnered excellent reviews that labelled the work as ‘immersive’, ‘moving’ and ‘powerful’. In 2025, Lara received a nomination in the ‘Camden Fringe’ category at Everything Theatre’s Etties Awards. That Boy Has No Shoes was selected for London’s Voila! Theatre Festival 2024 and was nominated for an OffFest Award in the ‘Voila!’ category. In March 2025, the show premiered in Lara’s home country at Cape Town’s Homecoming Centre (District Six Museum) in honour of South Africa’s Human Rights Day.
Lara is also a co-founder and company member of Et al. They are a theatre company in London that specialises in durational performance, with the aim to create immense joy! Their work interrogates themes of labour-as-performance, nostalgia, accumulation, community and control. As part of Et al., Lara has performed at various theatres in London and was invited to perform at the interactive arts festival, Voidspace Live 2025 and 2026. They will return to the festival in 2027. Et al.’s biggest goal is to put on a 24-hour durational show.
Practice
Lara’s aim is to create new artistic, social and political experiences. In her practice, she uses writing and scenography to create a temporal space that forces the past and present into a confrontation. She follows a holistic approach to making, creating the aural and visual components of the work simultaneously, and combines them using performer practices. Through this process, Lara is presented onstage as the ‘scenographer-as-performer’. She appears as a character version of herself, presenting a performance style which navigates between ‘acting’ for the audience and ‘performing a task’ for the stage.
Education
Lara trained in acting at Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in London and developed her skills as a theatre maker at UAL: Wimbledon College of Arts. She continued her studies at Royal Central School of Speech and Drama on MA Advanced Theatre Practice and graduated with distinction. When she feels ready, she will return to university to get her PhD.