Samambaia Issues
May 25 – July 27, 2024
Samambaia Issues by Camila Rocha will take place at Öktem Aykut from May 25th until July 20th, 2024. The opening will take place on Saturday on the 25th of May, between 15.00-20.00.
Rocha’s new one-person exhibition in Istanbul after five years, Samambaia Issues, deals with her in-depth research on ferns, one of the oldest living species on our planet. A large-scale installation, On the Fernable, created as a result of a collaboration with botanist Anderson Santos and architect Aslıhan Demirtaş, combines approaches scientific, artistic and architectural. Rocha’s meticulous and observant watercolor drawings, her acrylic paintings that bring together rich interpretations of floral abstraction, and a large-scale canvas installation can be found spread out into the gallery space.

To catch the light and the movement in leaves is a challenge that Camila took on by painting a peculiar fern that became the subject of her research for years to come. She was drawn not only to the appearance of the fern, but to the fragility that was revealed: While the fern appeared very resilient, it would die immediately when cross-cut to be painted. A new sprout of the fern would appear brown, almost burnt, which prevents animals from eating it. Counter-intuitively, when the fern grows, it switches from brown to purple to green. In other words, while some of Camila’s paintings appear to be suspended in a purple liquid from another reality, this reality is anchored in and inhabited by the samambaia that inspires it.*