melanie bonajo (they/them/theirs) is an artist, filmmaker, sexological bodyworker, somatic sex coach and educator, cuddle workshop facilitator and activist. Through their videos, performances, photographs, and installations, they examine current conundrums of co-existence in a crippling capitalist system, and address themes of eroding intimacy and isolation in an increasingly sterile, technological world. They research how technological advances and commodity-based pleasures increase feelings of alienation, removing an individual’s sense of belonging. Their works present anticapitalist methods to reconnect and to explore sexualities, intimacies and feelings. bonajo’s experimental documentaries often feature communities living or working on the margins of society, either through illegal means or cultural exclusion, and the paradoxes inherent to ideas of comfort with a strong sense for community, equality and body-politics.
bonajo studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy and completed residencies at the Rijksakademie voor Beeldende Kunst in Amsterdam (2009-10) and at ISCP in New York (2014).
In 2014 melanie bonajo started working on their monumental Night Soil Trilogy, consisting of Night Soil – Fake Paradise (2014), Night Soil – Economy of Love (2015) and Night Soil – Nocturnal Gardening (2016). Night Soil is a trilogy of documentaries presenting progressive (sometimes illegal) approaches through the portraits of ayahuasca consumers, sex worker activists or women farmers. In 2016, Progress vs Regress was released, followed by Progress vs Sunsets in 2017. This new Trilogy examines extinction or endangerment of vulnerable groups through techno-capital development, but also extinction in an abstract sense, extinction of feelings and thoughts. In TouchMETell (2019) bonajo invites children (and adults) to think and talk about intimacy, their limits and body awareness. In 2022, When the body says Yes was released and presented as the Dutch Entry at the Venice Biennial. In 2023 melanie bonajo finished the work Schule der Liebenden commissioned by HORA Theatre Zurich, which also deals with body awareness and fragility.
melanie bonajo represented The Netherlands at the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022 with When the body says Yes. bonajo has been working with a curatorial team consisting of Orlando Maaike Gouwenberg, Geir Haraldseth and Soraya Pol. The scenography for their immersive installation When the body says Yes is created in collaboration with Théo Demans.