Writer: Lara van Huyssteen
The official policy of apartheid in South Africa, which enforced racial segregation by the minority white population, officially ran from 1948 until its eventual demise in 1994. But start and end dates convey a sense of hard delineation that is rarely a reflection of real life. The seeds of apartheid were sown long before, and its after-effects continue to this day.
Writer/performer Lara van Huyssteen is part of what she terms the “born free” generation – South Africans born after apartheid’s legal demise, ensuring that all the country’s people have the same constitutional rights and protections. Her piece That Boy Has No Shoes looks back at her country’s past – but, unusually, through four artefacts with their own stories to tell.
Initially, van Huyssteen is silent, constructing a fifth plinth to match the ones displaying the four artefacts. She breaks off from her assembly task to place a microphone in front of each object in turn, giving them the opportunity to “speak”. Each recorded story is voiced by a drama student, and the predominantly audio aspect of the tales encourages the audience to engage more than perhaps an onstage recitation would.
And so we hear from an axe that, in 1940, was used in the “Battle of Andringa Street”, where white students at the University of Stellenbosch rose up against local “coloured” residents, invading their homes and destroying property; from an eviction notice slapped on a black man’s home in Sophiatown in 1955; from a passbook of ID papers, protests against which precipitated the Sharpeville massacre; a camera which witnessed student protestors being gunned down by police.
Van Huyssteen occasionally breaks into song, including the Xhosa hymn Nikosi Sikelei’ iAfrika, the protest song which formed the basis for the country’s post-apartheid national anthem. But the first time in which we really see her perform is as she dons a luxurious animal print faux fur coat, and lip-syncs to a recording of Miriam Makeba’s address to a committee of the United Nations in 1963. Every stumble, every rustle of paper as Makeba turned the pages of her notes, is recreated.
But the true strength of van Huyssteen’s delivery comes at the end, as the fifth plinth is completed and she stands to give her own testimony. Her story, as a white girl born after the end of apartheid but still witness to the divisions in society, is honest and heartfelt. It is a thought-provoking signal that the modern generation of South Africans, whatever their colour or background, is working to overcome the stains of history.
Reviewed on 3 August 2024.
Camden Fringe runs until 25 August 2024
The Reviews Hub Score
Thought-provoking
