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n:u (melissandre varin)

floating
n:u (melissandre varin) is an atmosphere-maker with a practice rooted in Congolese, Guadeloupean, and Beninese heritages. Building upon (more than) human, cross-border collaborations, they unearth ancestral ceremonies to be with change.
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n:u (melissandre varin) (b. Gonesse, France, 1992) is an atmosphere-maker with a practice rooted in Congolese, Guadeloupean, and Beninese heritages. Building upon (more than) human, cross-border collaborations, they unearth ancestral ceremonies to be with change. They play with unexpected pairings between materials, bodies, and concepts, disrupting colonial binaries and dominant narratives. n:u combines intuitive, embodied-knowledge with a political ecology approach grounded by an MSc in Environment and Sustainable Development from University College of London (UCL). 

n:u’s experimental practice unfolds with emotional excavation, ancestrality, and contemporary devotional use of materials such as cotton, soil, fire, salt, rum, hair, water, or molasses. They make performance arts, installations, sculptures, and liberatory infrastructures. This is reflected in their recent performances at Tate Britain, Lọpọ Lọpọ, as well as reparative curatorial initiatives including les ongles noirs dirty nails (Dakar–Birmingham, 2022–24), B.O.O.K (UK, 2020–23), Open Call (online, 2020-23), and PAPAYA (Luxembourg-UK 2019–23).

n:u has received support and awards from institutions including the Henry Moore Foundation, Arts Council England, and l'Ambassade de France x l’Institut français du Bénin (programme Inspiration Bénin, au coeur des mondes Africains). They currently hold fellowships with Axis, and John Feeney Trust, and serve as a steering group member for CVAN WM in the UK, alongside their role as an invited founding member of Popo Culture in Grand Popo, Benin. They have designed atmospheres and infrastructured unusual ways of working, including with longer-term collaborators Eastside Projects, Ban Workshop, and Future Ritual. n:u's reparative practice is nourished by friendships, more-than-humans, and homes like Finding Etherea.

Lived Experience

n:u (melissandre varin) was born in a lower class Black family with disabled and chronically ill parents. n:u (melissandre varin) is a Black queer and neurodivergent Pisces parent. They love turning dreams into reality.

 

de la boue et des racines

an art, library, and rest station

digital tour: here

commissioned by Coventry Biennial

image credit: Ayesha Jones, Marley Starskey Butler, linoleum dreams, installation view Coventry Bienniale (GB) 2021-2022

linoleum dreams

by n:u (melissandre varin) and Jérémie Priam

Digital Video

duration 08 min 29 second

supported by Oustide In (GB)

Presenting the Caribbean banana trade as a site of desire and displacement, n:u and Jeremie’s audio-visual assemblage spans 4,000 miles. On Martinique (FR), Jeremie’s aunt Lilianne shares her knowledge of growing organic bananas. On the island, toxic pesticides sprayed on banana crops have contaminated the landscape…

Handle with care/ prendre avec soin

extraction of knowledge (2021)

how to throw mud against white walls

anointment

les mains de ma mère

by n:u (melissandre varin) and Sym Stellium

digital video

12min 28sec

filmed and edited by Rachel Bunce

audio description & captioning by Seán Elder

Two people in motion, using Palestinian olive oil and soil - oscillating between care and violence amidst a rapidly transforming urban landscape.

Commissioned by: Byuka aka Fortune Tailed Beast & Giulia Casalini for Burned House Horizons

Image credit: Eda Sancakdar Onikinci, embrace,…

embrace

re-assembling

dirty nails (les ongles noirs)

A.WAKE

one for the road (un dernier pour la route)

Featured in

Collaboration

Artists in Conversation: Anna F Hughes, Dorothy Hunter and n:u (melissandre varin)

By Axis
Curated

Highlights: 11 - 17 May, 2026

By Axis
Collaboration

Artists in Conversation: n:u (melissandre varin), Anna F Hughes and Dorothy Hunter

By Axis

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