Monica Tolia is an Asian American and neurodivergent visual artist, choreographer & organiser, based in London. Their multidisciplinary practice culminates into sensory installations and performances drawing on communal ritual acts, ecological, animist & Taoist spiritual themes as decolonial spaces. Their research is based on how non-Western knowledge practices can inform collective-building, deep connections & healing amongst human and more-than-human worlds, contemplating critical questions with regard to influences of technology & political reality.
Their most recent production ‘a snake in the house means the family will never want’ premiered at Resolution Festival at The Place (June 2022). Previous performances and awards include Décalé 6 at Space289 (June 2022), SHAPESLewisham Creative Happenings Grant to produce Lunar New Year Festival (2022), a-n Artists Bursary (2021/22), Deptford X Festival (2021), Trinity Laban Ignite Award (2021), Deptford X Residency ‘how to be together again’ (2020), ACE National Lottery Projects Grant for ‘Future Present’ (2019), and Chalton Gallery x Art Night 2019. Since 2021, they are co-founder of Have you eaten yet? Collective, an artist-led ESEA diaspora project organising events on the intersections of food, migration, art/activism & creating affectionate space.