The Brooklyn Rail

An art which is “modern” does not exist. There is only one art, that which is eternal.
—Egon Schiele, my translation from the French

There are memories of my grandmother making quilts for me—and then with me, seated at the sewing machine between generations—evoked every time I see fabric made into art. Pieces come together forming another: a whole is its parts. Cassandra Mayela Allen’s current exhibition, Aquel Amplex, at Instituto Cervantes in Manhattan, is exactly about that embrace.

Curated by Fabiola R. Delgado and Carlos Núñez, Aquel Amplex is a collection of the Venezuelan-born artist’s recent textile and painting works. Featured (under the same title as the show) is a chain-like net constructed with braids made of a kaleidoscope of color knotted together (2024–26). It cuts across the open space of the gallery in the familiar form of a wall or a fence, but one that we can see through and walk around.

This title is inspired by a 1969 letter from Brazilian artist Hélio Oiticica to Lygia Clark when both lived in exile, where they mention “aquel amplex,” “that embrace.” In their letters, they investigate relationships between object and viewer, giving the “spectator-author” a sort of power in participation. In one from 1968, Clark writes, “I speak of a well, from inside which a sound would be taken, not by the you-well, but by the other, in the sense that he throws his own stone … It is as if I had created an egg of space that belongs to me and that embraces me.”¹

Aquel Amplex was made over two years’ time with the help of many hands. In this piece, the artist attached braids woven by people invited to take part themselves and with their own material. Mayela Allen is particularly known for her cooperative practice: a former piece, Maps of Displacement (2021– ), involved Venezuelan immigrants and the pieces of clothing they brought with them to this country. Aware of its foundations in Venezuelan and Latin American modernism, the act and its result is an homage to history—human and art. Aquel Amplex confronts notions of temporality by enlisting the memory and experience of people other than just the artist, the community, emphasizing a true sense of what it means to collaborate.

Hung around the perimeter are more pieces created individually, which further explain the mentality behind the work. There is Hija de la Independencia (2026), drawn in colored pencil strokes across paper as if ticked by a clock moved by currents. Hazme de todo menos daño (2026) is a ribboned grid overlaying more rainbow scratches cascading into each other. Tassels untied open to interpretation past the border of the canvas. A breeze could blow them into the garden.²

In keeping with her practice, Mayela Allen hosted two communal braiding workshops at the Instituto in conjunction with the exhibition. In the first, flags of South American countries which previously hung in the foyer of the building were repurposed as craft material. Participants sat at a shared table and cut the squares into shreds, braiding in quiet conversation. “Is this yours?” A woman asks. “No,” I answered. “None of it is.”

These new braids were added to another piece on view: American as in del continente americano Abya Yala, tierra viva de sangre vital, donde el Sur es el Norte que nos guía en la construccion de un sentimiento de unidad y pertenencia (2025–26)³, which will be added to the Instituto’s permanent collection after the show’s closing. Attached to the wall like a stripped windmill is a wooden clothing rack decorated by a bricolage of cascading fabric as if branches of a willow tree. Introducing the event, Mayela Allen laughed, sharing, with valid frustration at the phrase, that the structure is engraved with a big “Made in America.” I fantasized about what it would be like to change the idea of the flag while looking at an instance of exactly that.

It was strangely pleasurable to rip into something so seemingly sacred and emblematic. Out of destruction a new form was born. Stripped of their unity, these symbols were rewritten into another structure more representative of a lived reality—one that isn’t unitary, monolingual, or stagnant. The process of weaving literally altered the meaning of the physical material’s metaphor. The artist’s practice speaks to the strength of ideas, how language can change what we decide is real through objects themselves. Though I can’t help but continue to wonder about the concept and the medium: which really came first?

The exhibition is part of a broader wave in the art world as it relates to its institutions. As if in response to the current US regime, its racist nationalism, and the dangers of demonization posed in its domestic war against Spanish-speaking immigrants (et al.) is an emphasis on Spanish-speaking programs and their accessibility. In April, the Met hosted a talk entirely in Spanish, the largest ever, with Frida Escobedo, the architect commissioned to redesign the Tang Wing. El Met, as the museum is known in Spanish, is hosting a talk between the artist, Mayela Allen, and curators Delgado and Nuñez on May 22 in conjunction with the exhibition, titled “Textile as Shared Language.”

I remember a man in the audience who held up a Mexican flag and cheered at the proclamation introducing Escobedo: “New York es para todos!” And I think a lot about community and social engagement, especially when institutions of all kinds are stifled and therefore stifling. I think about the nature of textiles, how their usefulness and ubiquity is as applicable to riding a crowded elevator in outfits on the first day of spring—art takes many faces. It’s been done forever and will forever continue. How to make it new? Do it again yourself. Identity is also thread.