About

Pau(la) Chaves Bonilla aka as La ChicaScratch is a choreographer, performance artist and queer grassroots organiser born and raise in Colombia and based in The Netherlands. They studied contemporary dance, physical theatre and circus in New York, Bogota and Berlin and later obtained a BA in Choreography at the School for New Dance Development in the Amsterdam University of the Arts. Since 2015 they create their own artistic works and in 2023 they obtained their MA in Fine Arts and Design, with emphasis on ecology, social justice and art, at the Sandberg Institute in Amsterdam.

Their artistic research investigates social phenomena in a journalistic way -censorship and resistance, gender issues, the commodification of art and social movements in neoliberal societies- and transforms these findings into theatrical performances, video, writings or installations. Their works often portray dystopian landscapes mixing elements of speculative imagination, social critique and magic realism.

They mix ritual making with elements of satire, commemoration, protest or denouncement. Aligning itself within Decolonial South Globe legacies, their artistic work offer spaces to practice, produce and re-imagine a poetics of liberation.

Their works have been presented at Moving Futures Festival (Amsterdam), Theater Aan Zee (Oostende), My Wild Flag Festival (Stockholm), Theater Spektakel (Zürich), Impulstanz (Vienna), CALA Festival (Cori), Theater Bellevue (Amsterdam), Welcome to our Guesthouse (Rotterdam), Abundance Chapter - Het Hem (Zaandam), International Queer Migrant Film Festival (Amsterdam), HAU Hebbel am Ufer (Berlin), Kondenz Festival (Belgrade), Mariconeo Diva Night (Bogotá), Queer Film Festival Utrecht, Framer Framed (Amsterdam), TQ Tanzquartier (Vienna), Theater Insblau (Leiden), Seki Sano (Bogotá), among others. In 2019 Chaves Bonilla was awarded the 3Package Deal fund for International Talents by AFK for the ‘Engaged Art’ coalition and from 2020 to 2023 they were a house artist at Veem House for Performance.

As a mover they have performed in the pieces of Benîot Lachambre, Amanda Piña/Nadaproductions, Ko Morobushi, Setareh Fatehi, Nadia Bekkers, Natalia Sorzano, Nina Boas, Oneka von Schrader, Carles Casallacs, Abner Preis, Riccardo Guratti, Jo-Ann With, Athena Kokoronis, Diana Casas/Aerodanza, Hilda Moucharrafieh, Thais Di Marco and Circolino.

Their creative texts/essays have been published at Paradoxa Climate Fictions, The Climate Justice Code, Endangered Human Movements Vol. 3 - The school of the jaguar and El CuerpoSpín.

Chaves Bonilla also works as a grassroots organiser. Between 2012 and 2016 they were co-organiser of Queeristan – a D.I.Y. Festival in Amsterdam to explore and counter the normative workings of gender, sexuality and identity. In 2020 they co-founded Papaya Kuir a grassroots lesbotransfeminist collective led by Latinx trans and queer migrants/refugees. Together they organise workshops, art projects and festivals to celebrate the emergence of diasporic latinx culture, foster a sense of belonging among queer and trans migrants and create spaces of solidarity, collective pleasure and social transformation.

Their practice vindicates culture, art and somatics as technologies to counter and alleviate the harm inflicted by hegemonic power structures and as platforms with the potential to spark transformation on both personal and collective spheres.