Portakal
A series of works on paper and collage; Prussian Blue pigment rubbed onto archival digital fine art print, glue. 35 X 55 in. 2024
Portakal explores migration and displacement through the journey of the orange—both as fruit and as word. Building on her film Tristeza, which depicts oranges floating in the Mediterranean Sea, Benbenisty captures movements too fast to perceive in film by creating a large series of works on paper from individual video frames. Each print—a single moment of an orange’s drift—is hand-worked with Prussian blue pigment rubbed onto the digital surface, creating an animation-like sequence that slows and materializes the act of floating.
The work links the 15th and 16th-century introduction of sweet oranges to the Mediterranean with contemporary narratives of displacement. The term “portakal” (orange) originates from the Portuguese word for Portugal, reflecting the impact of Portuguese maritime trade during the Age of Exploration. From Arabic (burtuqal) to Turkish, Persian, and beyond, the word mirrors the movement of citrus fruits across oceans as Portuguese merchants introduced sweet orange varieties from China and India.
The exhibition includes a vintage “P (Papa)” maritime signal flag—historically used to command personnel to return to their ships before departure—symbolizing imminent movement and the cyclical nature of departure and return. The orange’s buoyancy depends entirely on its peel: intact, it floats; removed, it sinks. This precarious condition becomes a metaphor for displacement, where survival and arrival hinge on fragile, protective layers.