Bonikta’s work is marked by a diversity of techniques and languages, including illustration, graffiti, painting, photography, video, and animation. Amazonian ancestry and the unequal, exploitative dynamics of large cities are recurring themes in his work, which draws on technological resources to create scenarios and characters that reinforce the idea that neither the present nor the future can be imagined without the existence and protagonism of Indigenous peoples.
For the 14th Mercosul Biennial, Bonikta presents a commissioned piece centered on the aparelhagem party culture of Pará. For the artist, aparelhagens are seen as creative strategies of survival and inventiveness, as they are born in and for the peripheries. Through the technologies developed in these contexts, countless original aesthetic and rhythmic creations emerge—moving from city to city, crossing rivers and highways, and drawing crowds wherever they go.
Fernanda Medeiros
Bonikta (Brazil, 1996) is an independent multi-artist, researcher, and cultural producer, originally from Ourém, in the interior of the Amazon region of Pará. He creates and expresses his work through the artistic appearances of the Boniktas, who draw an enchanted universe inspired by the daily life and imagination of the Amazon, reflections of their experiences and dreams that trace crossings between the countryside and the city, the street and the forest, up and down the river. He was part of the first edition of Bienal das Amazônias. He lives in Belém, Brazil.
