The libretto of the opera was primarily inspired by the works of Nikolai Gogol, national traditions and folklore, folk ceremonies, and epic poems.
The opera When the Fern Blooms was written on request of the French concert company "Alitepa" for the worldwide exhibition in Paris in 1978.
[1][2] Despite the overthrow of the Soviet regime in the 1990s and significant public interest in this work, the opera was not performed in full for a long time.
According to Vasyl Vovkun, this staging of the opera was held in honour of artist Eugene Lysyk, who was the scenographer of the banned production from the 1970s.
During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Nina Matviyenko's performance of Yevhen Stankovych’s opera-ballet When the Fern Blooms, which had originally premiered in 2017, having been described as 'banned' during the Soviet era, and had been live-streamed by the Lviv National Opera, was re-released online.