  We report on experiments of perfect absorption for surface gravity waves
impinging a wall structured by a subwavelength resonator. By tuning the
geometry of the resonator, a balance is achieved between the radiation damping
and the intrinsic viscous damping, resulting in perfect absorption by critical
coupling. Besides, it is shown that the resistance of the resonator, hence the
intrinsic damping, can be controlled by the wave amplitude, which provides a
way for perfect absorption tuned by nonlinear mechanisms. The perfect absorber
that we propose, without moving parts or added material, is simple, robust and
it presents a deeply subwavelength ratio wavelength/size $\simeq 18$.
