About

Daniel Hellmann is a singer, performer, dance and theater maker from Zurich. He studied philosophy, classical singing and theater / performance and since 2012, he has been developing his own artistic work, touring internationally and winning various awards. Hellmann sees his artistic practice as a form of intersectional activism. His projects explore the body, bodily relationships and desire, and question social norms and power relations in the fields of sexuality, human and animal rights.

As part of his interactive performance "Full Service" (2014), Hellmann has executed hundreds of services around the world for a corresponding negotiated fee. His solo performance "Traumboy" (2015) on male sex work was selected for Sélection Suisse en Avignon and for Swiss Selection Edinburgh. Hellmann recently developed the female counterpart "Traumgirl" together with Anne Welenc - a third production on the subject of sex work, which premiered in August 2019 at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Since 2017, Hellmann's work has increasingly focused on the relationships between humans and other animals. The music theater performance "Requiem for a piece of meat" (2017) was awarded the June Johnson Dance Prize and invited to the Swiss Dance Days 2019. With his alter ego "Soya the Cow" - a sex-positive, feminist, vegan drag cow - he has created the one-cow show "Dear Human Animals" (2020), released the music album "Purple Grass" (2021) and several music videos. In 2022, Hellmann traveled across the USA as Soya the Cow - with the solo exhibition "Planet Moo," performances and activism. In 2023, Hellmann was the associated artist of the Swiss Theater Days and presented the art walk "Try Walking in My Hooves", with which he has already performed in Amsterdam, Newcastle, Paris, Geneva, Zurich, San Francisco, Hong Kong and many other cities. As Soya the (House) Cow, Hellmann works closely with Tanzhaus Zurich.

In addition to his own works, Hellmann has created other pieces in variable artistic collaborations - "Nach Lampedusa - Wandererfantasien" (with Ursina Greuel & Samuel Fried / 2014) on the situation of refugees in Switzerland, and the performance "All In" (with Layton Lachman & Anne Welenc / 2019) on triadic love relationships.

From 2018-2021, Hellmann has been curating the performing arts for the interdisciplinary gender and sexualities festival LA FÊTE DU SLIP in Lausanne.