THE COCA LEAF ENTANGLEMENT (ON-GOING RESEARCH)
Departing from stigmatized narratives that surround the Coca leaf, Maria Paloma explores how artistic and creative initiatives can serve as a tangible counter-archive for this plant. In this work, she uses root systems as a metaphor for the social and cultural connections that the leaf symbolizes in Colombian culture. Through collaborative embroidery, she invites you to place the project in a Dutch context and explore how people outside Colombia perceive coca. By mapping these images, allowing them to take root in the local imagination, and using dialogue as a research method, the counter-archive grows, while simultaneously highlighting the importance of collective knowledge development.
The piece will be embroidered live during Dutch Design Week 2025.
Material piece resulting from the research ‘Building the Coca Counter-archive’ started in 2024.
DATE
2025
TYPE
Textile, graphic, performative.