BIOGRAPHY

Nico Athene (b.1986 Cape Town) is a body of colliding personas and intimate intricacies. Her trans-disciplinary practice is based on an expanded notion of performance, and slips between a critical view on photography, multimedia collage, video, installation and sculpture. Athene began making art around the complexities of trading gendered identity and relationship as an aesthetic practice in itself, when she working as a stripper in a club. Since then, her practices focused on defracted and enmeshed notions of identity-beyond-capitalism, which she understands as an urgent and ecological prerogative. Athene facilitates workshops on eco-intimacy and understanding-consent-through-touch as part of her expanded performance practice.

Athene holds a Masters in Fine Art from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg (distinction), a Master’s degree in Public Health from the University of Edinburgh and a BA in Social Anthropology from the University of Cape Town. She is a trained birth doula and facilitator in various psycho and movement modalities, including constellations therapy and butoh. Her work has been exhibited, installed and performed in various galleries and locations including the Pretoria Art Museum (Pretoria), Stevenson (Online), Kalashikovv (Johannesburg), the AVA (Cape Town), Bagfactory (Johannesburg), and Theatre Arts (Cape Town). She has worked on commissions: for the Institute for Creative Art (2022), the Spier Light Art Festival (2022), the National Arts Festival, South Africa (2020), and Brett Bailey’s Constellations (2021, 2022). She has been Artist in Residence at MusicDance 21 (Cape Town), Sante Fe Art Institute (NM), Vermont Studio Centre (VM), Arts Letter and Numbers (NY), Arteles (Finland), and Any Body Dance Lab (Cape Town).

Athene is the recipient of an Open University Society Network and Centre for Human Rights and the Arts Grant from Bard College in support of her workshop The Aesthetics of Embodied Ecologies. Her MFA was supported by grants from the Andrew Mellon Foundation, Wits Post Graduate Grant and RINC Grant from the University of Witwatersrand.

CURRICULUM VITAE

EDUCATION
2022	Masters in Fine Art, University of Witwatersrand. Awarded with Distinction.
2017 – 2018	Family Constellations Training, African Constellations.
2021	Masters in Public Health, University of Edinburgh
2012	Astanga Yoga Teacher Training (YTT200), Haum of Yoga.
2007	BA Social Anthropology and English, University of Cape Town. Awarded with Distinction.

COMMISIONED WORKS
2022	80min minute performance for Constellations. Curated by Brett Bailey. Spier Estate, Cape Town.
	No One Gets Out of This Alive (Enfant). 20-40minute performance. Commissioned by Douglas Gimberg and Insitu_Africa as part of Pretext group exhibition, Salt River, Cape Town.
	‘Cruising Utopia’ solo installative performance ft. DRAGMOTHER (Tazmé Pillay) on the decks. Commissioned by Jay Pather and Luvuyo Equiano Nyawose, for the Institute for Creative Arts (ICA) Live Art Festival. Cape Town
	Feel SomeTHING. 12 minute looped multichannel video and custom built rig. For Spier Light Art Festival. Commissioned by Jay Pather and Vaughn Sadie, Stellenbosch.
2021	135 minute untitled performance for Constellations. Curated/directed by Brett Bailey. Spier Estate, Cape Town.
2020	Together Apart. 45minute film. Commissioned by the National Arts Festival South Africa, Makhanda.

EXHIBITIONS / PERFORMANCES
2022	Constellations. Curated by Brett Bailey. Spier Estate, Cape Town.
	Pretext group exhibition, curated by Douglas Gimberg, Insitu_Africa,Cape Town.
	Vrek: Performance-at-the-edge-of-humanity-as-art with Tossie van Tonder in collaboration with Sumalgy Nuro and Garth Erasmus, Theatre Arts, Cape Town.
	Institute for Creative Arts (ICA) Live Art Festival. Cape Town. Commissioned by Jay Pather and Luvuyo Equiano Nyawose.
	Spier Light Art Festival. Commissioned by Jay Pather and Vaughn Sadie, Stellenbosch.

2021	Constellations. Curated by Brett Bailey. Spier Estate, Cape Town.
	Music Dance 2021 Performances in collaboration with Tossie van Tonder, Vasco Mirine, Garth Erasmus and Sumalgy Nuro. Curated by Thalia Laric and Manuela Lucia Tessi. Theatre Arts, Cape Town.
	Sasol New Signatures 2021 (group exhibition) Pretoria Art Museum, Pretoria.
	A Short Philosophy on Medium, (group exhibition) curated by Michele Rolstone and Henrietta Scholtz, AVA Gallery, Cape Town.
	We Need New Archetypes (solo), Black Dog Studios, Cape Town.

2020	Nonrepresentational, (group exhibition) Stevenson Gallery, Online.
	Curated Programme National Arts Festival, Makhanda.
	Thami Mnyele Fine Art Awards Exhibition, Ekhuruleni.
2019	Sasol New Signatures, (group exhibition) Pretoria Art Museum, Pretoria.
	Its Rude to Stare but You’re Welcome to See, (group exhibition) curated by Isabella Chydenius, Michaelis Galleries Cape Town.
	Institute for Creative Arts Live Art Workshop, Group Showcase, curated by Jay Pather, Cape Town, South Africa.
	Bibliotheca 700, (group exhibition) Bag Factory, Johannesburg
	Home Affairs, (group exhibition) curated by Astrid Gebhardt for Cape Town Art Week, Daor Contemporary Gallery, Cape Town, South Africa
2018	I’ll Show You Mine If You Show Me Your Wallet, curated by Ed Young, Kalashnikovv Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa
	Body Politic 2: Pathology, curated by Louise Westerhout, Cape Town, South Africa.
	Buffer Zones, (group exhibition) curated by Juliana Irene Smith, Vaasa, Finland.
	Any Body Dance Lab Group Showcase, curated by Kopano Maroga, Thalia Laric and Kristina Johnston, Cape Town, South Africa.
2017	In Bed With Artists Exhibition, curated by Nico Athene and Sitaara Stodle, Cape Town, South Africa
	Interactive installation In Bed With Artists Residency, curated by Nico Athene and Juliana Irene Smith, Cape Town, Johannesburg.

IN THE MEDIA
2022	Art Throb: https://artthrob.co.za/2021/11/08/in-bed-with-my-sister-nico-athenes-we-need-new-archetypes/
2019	Art Throb: https://artthrob.co.za/2019/10/25/memories-of-gender-its-rude-to-stare-but-youre-welcome-to-see-at-michaelis-galleries/
2018	City Press: https://city-press.news24.com/Voices/nico-athenes-metoo-statement-20180429
2018	Bubblegum Club: In Bed With Nico Athene – A Consideration of The Body and Embodied Labour as an Aesthetic
2017	Huffington Post and City Press: Nico Athene is Disrupting the Art World By Holding a Residency in Her Bed

AWARDS and GRANTS
2022	Microgrant from the Centre for Human Rights and the Arts, and Open University Society Network at Bard Collage.
2021	Sasol New Signatures Merit Award.
2021	RINC funding, Wits School of the Arts, Wits University.
2019	Sasol New Signatures Merit Award.
2019	Postgraduate Research Grant, Wits University.
2019	Arts Research Africa WSOA Mellon funded Masters Bursary.
2007	Graduation BA with distinction in Social Anthropology Class medal SAN3015S (Anthropology through ethnography) Dean’s Merit List
2006	Class medal REL2048S (Psychology of religion) Dean’s Merit List
2005	Entrance scholarship Dean’s Merit List

RESIDENCIES and CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION
2020	Arts Research Africa Symposium. Workshop Presentation: Approximating unKnowns as an Ethics Towards Encountering Difference
2019	Arts, Objects and Archive Conference and Paper Presentation
2019	Live Art Workshop Institute for Creative Arts with the support of Pro Helvitia, Michaelis, UCT, Cape Town
2018	Sante Fe Art Institute, Artist in Residence, New Mexico, USA
2018	Any Body Dance Lab, Artist in Residence, Cape Town, South Africa
2018	Wiser Symposium on Well Sexuality, Panelist, University of Witswaterstrand, Johannesburg
2018	Vermont Studio Centre, Artist in Residence, Vermont, USA
2017	Arteles Creative Residency Program, Artist in Residence, Finland
2014	Centre for the Archive, University of Cape Town, Research Resident ‘Body as Archive’