Crosscurrents: Jeanne F. Jalandoni and Massiel Mafes

Crosscurrents is a duo exhibition featuring two New York City-based artists whose blended textile paintings revisit family archives and oral histories to tell their personal stories as second-generation Americans of Cuban and Filipino descent. Drawing from their distinct cultures, Massiel Mafes and Jeanne F. Jalandoni see textiles as a natural extension of painting and a method for layering lived experiences with second-hand memories passed down from their ancestors.

‘Crosscurrents’ can also be defined as a tendency to move counter to the usual trend, to pave a new path forward even if one is met with adversity or obstacles of every kind. Mafes and Jalandoni encounter new streams of thinking and rhythms of belonging as they flow together to create alternative modes of storytelling through stitching or staining these opposite mediums.

Born in Miami Florida, Massiel Mafes repurposes her family's second-hand clothing into textile paintings as a metaphor to physically connect with her Cuban heritage and reflect on her dual identity. Drawing inspiration from Latin American literature, her family's oral storytelling, and the lack of a physical archive, she explores themes of belonging and connection through painting and collage. Combining reality with fantasy, she meticulously hand-stitches pieces of discarded clothing to create portraits, landscapes, and seascapes. Her work merges Cuba, Miami, and her current home in New York to form blended self-portraits. 

Jeanne F. Jalandoni, born and based in New York City, is a painter and textile artist who combines weaving and machine-knitting with oil painting to navigate the multifaceted experiences of her Filipino American identity. She draws inspiration from her family archives and childhood memories while also researching the historical relationship between the United States and the Philippines. The artist incorporates Filipino national symbols such as the carabao (water buffalo), bangus (milkfish), and mangoes into her painted fabric works to decipher biculturalism, bring attention to domestic and female labour, and challenge Western stereotypes of Filipino American identity. 

While merging memory, myth, and the imaginary, both artists invite us to reflect on the multiple places and people that make up our inner and outer worlds. With paintbrush and thread, Mafes and Jalandoni find their way through the dreams of their ancestors and stories spoken around the kitchen table to shape personal narratives of their making. The intermixing of textile and painting processes speaks to the fluidity of memories—recollections whose fibers may be fixed in place for ancestors, but can always be reinterpreted and transformed by those listening. While these hybrid materials lead to new forms of knowledge-keeping, Mafes and Jalandoni discover ripples of colours that are reflective of their individual growth and rootedness to the landscapes they hold dear. Even though we may be looking at different oceans than generations before us, there is still a horizon line that connects us to their legacies. Crosscurrents can be seen as a meeting place for living histories to coexist together and an invitation to walk hand in hand with the keepsakes we wish to keep sacred. 

Massiel Mafes is a New York City-based artist from Miami, Florida. Her work explores themes of home, longing, and connection through painting and textiles. She earned her MFA in Fine Arts from the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. Currently, Mafes is the recipient of the AIM Fellowship at The Bronx Museum and the Bronx Council on the Arts BRIO Award. She has also participated in residencies at The Sam and Adele Golden Foundation for the Arts, Vermont Studio Center, and JOYA: arte + ecología.

Recent exhibitions include Dinner Gallery/Calderón, New York, NY (2025); PEEP Projects, Philadelphia, PA (2025); The Sam and Adele Golden Gallery, New Berlin, NY (2025); and Deli Gallery/Calderón, New York, NY (2024). In January 2026, Mafes’ work will be included in “Bronx Calling: The Seventh AIM Biennial” at The Bronx Museum, New York, NY. Her work has also been featured in New American Paintings #164 and Artmaze Magazine 32nd Edition.  

Jeanne F. Jalandoni (b. 1993) is a painter and textile artist born and based in New York City. Her solo and two-person exhibitions include shows at Cohen Gallery at Alfred University, Wellesley College, Taymour Grahne Projects, and Real Art Ways. Selected group exhibitions include the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art, Pen + Brush, The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, Pace University Art Gallery, Jeffrey Deitch, Ben Brown Fine Arts, Fragment Gallery, and Asia Society Texas Center.

Jalandoni has participated in artist residencies such as the Textile Arts Center, the Alfred University BIPOC Summer Residency, and the Sam & Adele Golden Foundation for the Arts. She has been featured in New American Paintings #164 and Wonder Women: Art of the Asian Diaspora. Jalandoni received a BFA in Studio Art from New York University (2015). In September 2025, she will begin an MA in Painting at the Royal College of Art in London, UK.

Public Program: 

Midway through the exhibition, there will be an artist walkthrough of the exhibit, where the artists will discuss their different approaches to tracing the personal stories, ancestral archives, and familial ties to multiple homelands through textile and painting techniques. 

Guest Writer: 

Samantha Lance is a Canadian curator and writer with a Master of Visual Studies in Curatorial Studies degree from the University of Toronto and a BFA with Distinction in Curatorial Practice from OCAD University. She is currently working as the Curator for the Visual Arts Centre of Clarington, located in Bowmanville, Ontario. Lance has worked with the Art Museum at the University of Toronto, The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, C Magazine, and the Art Gallery of Algoma.