Mónica Baptista

Istanbul Modern welcomes Mónica Baptista through a collaboration with Galeria Municipal do Porto and Ágora – Cultura e Desporto do Porto, based in Porto, Portugal, in Istanbul Modern during October-November 2026. Working primarily with moving images and photography, the artist focuses on water in the context of Istanbul as part of her research during the residency. Water serves not only as the subject of her work but also as an element that enables image-making through chemical processes. The works Baptista creates in response to Istanbul is presented at Istanbul Modern during the exhibition “Flowing City.”

About Mónica Baptista

Mónica Baptista (b. 1984, Porto) graduated from the Painting Department of the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Porto in 2007. Working across visual arts, documentary and experimental cinema, photography, installation, and expanded cinema, she focuses particularly on the photochemical processes of analog film. Manual film development and printing, along with interventions in 16 mm, 35 mm, and Super 8 film, form an important part of her practice. Baptista draws on a range of disciplines in her research, including music, literature, anthropology, phenomenology, and semiotics.