Join us for the opening reception of Alagaan ang Salaysáy (Take Care of the Story), a solo exhibition by artist Maureen Catbagan. The artist’s new project honors Filipino nurses in Queens, Brooklyn, and New York City. Drawing on the migration story sparked by the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act and the 1970s nurse recruitment drives, Catbagan gathers oral histories from a community whose work has sustained the city’s healthcare system for decades. The words tita (aunt), ate (sister), and kuya (brother) recur—titles of care and respect that transcend bloodlines. Visitors are invited to read these stories vocally, transforming each into what Catbagan calls “a living monument of care.” In doing so, the exhibition turns listening into an act of devotion, infusing nurses’ labor into cultural memory.

Opening: October 4, 6:00 – 9:00 PM at Flux IV
7:00 Opening remarks
7:30 Performance by Cordillera Cultural Ensemble (CCE)
7:45 Performance by Kinding Sindaw

Kinding Sindaw  is a non for profit theater and dance theater established in 1992 and based in NYC that presents repertoire from living tradition and intangible cultural heritage of the Mindanao, Southern Philippines through performances, dance, storytelling, kulintang music ensemble and silat martial art. We are Honoring the Indigenous and Sultanate Bangsamoro and those in diaspora. Kinding Sindaw is non for profit, AAPI / BIPOC lead and membership. Founded by Artistic Director Potri Ranka Manis, a Meranao Bai Labi in diaspora in 1992. 

Cordillera Cultural Ensemble is an ethnic group representing the Igorot people of the Cordillera Administrative Region in the Northern Philippines, primarily based in New York and other states. Our mission is to preserve and promote our indigenous culture and history through traditional dances, songs, and other cultural performances celebrating friendship, courtship, and other ethnic festivities, in collaboration with government and non-government organizations. 

Image: Maureen Catbagan, Alagaan ang Salaysay: Potri Ranka Manis (video still), 2025. Courtesy of the artist.