Meet the Team

Hansie is a highly regarded South African puppet designer, fabricator, and manipulator, renowned for his extensive career in theatre and puppetry. He earned an Honours degree in Fine Arts from the University of Pretoria, specializing in Information Design. Since 1975, Hansie has served as the Artistic Director of The Little Marionette Company, where his innovative work has been showcased at prominent venues and festivals both in South Africa and internationally, including performances in France, Austria, the United States, and Denmark.

Visagie’s contributions to the arts have earned him significant recognition, including the prestigious Alumni Laureate award from the University of Pretoria in 2002, and multiple nominations for the ARTES awards from SABC TV. In 2015, his company received a nomination for a Kyk-Net Fiesta, and in 2024, the production Surge, which he designed for The Magnet Theater, was nominated for a Fleur du Cap award.

Over the course of his career, Hansie has worked on more than seventy professional theatre productions—both for children and adults—alongside approximately thirty children’s television series and various commercials. His passion for puppetry and theatre extends beyond performance, as he has been deeply involved in training future generations of artists. He has taught students from esteemed institutions such as the University of Pretoria, Stellenbosch University, Tshwane University of Technology, and the Magnet Theatre, as well as candidates from UNIMA.

In addition to his work in puppetry and theatre, Hansie is skilled in directing, character design, set and costume creation, props, makeup design, and construction. He also pursues interests in scriptwriting, painting, and sculpting. Notably, in 2023, he contributed to the creation of characters for the opening ceremony of the Asian Soccer Cup in Qatar. Currently, he is part of the design and fabrication team for THE HERDS.