Rocha describes inspiration as cumulative. “A fleeting encounter with a striking profile, the tonal quality of a façade, an object glimpsed in an antique shop, or the texture of upholstery,” she tells The Wick, can all find their way back into her work. One recent example was an exotic bird she encountered in a market in Antwerp, which later entered the painting Sing Me Back Home. Beneath these gathered details sits a larger concern: how to make interior life visible. It is why Pina Bausch remains such an important reference for the artist, her ability to translate “psychological depth into physical expression” speaking closely to Rocha’s own approach.

Rocha’s paintings are often described as patchwork portraits, composite figures assembled from memory rather than direct observation. Faces become containers for feeling rather than fixed identities, while textiles and patterning carry their own symbolic weight. Some motifs are clear, others fade into suggestion.

The artist’s sensitivity to surface and structure is not incidental. Before turning fully to painting, Rocha studied fashion design in Paris and worked for Maison Martin Margiela and Damir Doma. Despite her career change, fashion has not entirely disappeared from Rocha’s work. It lingers in the way she handles silhouette, rhythm and fabric, and in the care with which clothing is used to signal character and atmosphere.

More recently, Rocha has found herself returning to the visual language of the 1920s to 1940s. She speaks of an almost instinctive familiarity with that period, and it now filters into her treatment of portraiture, gesture, attire and hairstyling. It suits a practice already attuned to the slippery nature of selfhood and memory.

Rocha’s champion, gallerist Sofie Van de Velde, was first drawn to her work through Instagram, later meeting Rocha at openings, where, as she recalls, “a certain unspoken connection seemed to emerge.” What holds her attention is the atmosphere Rocha creates on the canvas. “Her work creates a space where beauty and vulnerability coexist, without forcing a narrative, yet leaving a lasting impression,” Van de Velde tells The Wick. She also points to the artist’s “quiet strength”, adding that the paintings “invite you in gently, but reveal its layers the longer you stay with it.”

This slow reveal is part of what makes the work so persuasive. Van de Velde describes the decision to collaborate on The Wunderwall as something that “came very naturally,” saying it felt like “the right moment to bring her work into our context, one that values intuition, but also gives space for deeper engagement over time.” She adds that, the longer she works as a gallerist, the more she values “this kind of mutual recognition,” where “a shared enthusiasm between artist and gallery often forms the foundation for a meaningful and lasting collaboration.”

Rocha’s own measure of achievement is similarly grounded. Rather than naming a single exhibition or award, she points to the fact of sustaining herself through art, and to the way painting has transformed her life “not only materially, but on a deeply personal and existential level.” It is an answer entirely in keeping with the work itself, subtle and thoughtful; and profound in what it contains.

Rocha is currently showing as part of The Wunderwall Enlarged, a group exhibition at Gallery Sofie Van de Velde. As her practice continues to unfold, her portraits remain open and searching. They are less interested in pinning a person down than in staying with the complexity of what a person might hold.