No Place brings together four early- to mid-career painters from different points within the constellation of the Southeast Asian diaspora. Through painting, these artists explore what resides in their hearts: memories of elsewhere, experiences of in-betweenness, portals to other realms, and observations of everyday life. Rather than framing “no place” as a condition of unbelonging, the exhibition proposes it as a generative space of connection. Through their diasporic perspectives, the artists cultivate relationships with the cosmos, with disparate geographies, with others, and with themselves. In doing so, they suggest that belonging can emerge not from fixed coordinates, but through the ongoing act of looking, remembering, learning, and painting.

The artists here approach diaspora through distinct visual and poetic languages. For each, painting functions not only as a medium but also as a form of mediumship—a conduit through which memories, histories, and imagined futures are summoned. Like ancient mariners, these artists sail the tides with their diasporic consciousness as their compass. Their works move beyond narratives of displacement to envision possibilities of harmony, collective care, and belonging, offering speculative glimpses of dreams yet to be realized.

Words by Marissa Largo

Marigold Santos (b. 1981, Manila, Philippines; lives and works Calgary City, Alberta, Canada) immigrated from the Philippines to Canada with her family in 1988. She pursues an inter-disciplinary art practice that gathers notions around heritage and cultural identity, folklore, motherwork, labour and decolonization, which integrate the natural world and are presented within the otherworldly. Her paintings, drawings, sculptures, and tattoo work emphasize self-hoods and identities that embraces multiplicity, fragmentation and empowerment as informed by diasporic experiences. She holds a BFA from the University of Calgary, and an MFA from Concordia University. She was long-listed for the prestigious Sobey Art Award in 2023 and 2024 and was recently awarded the inaugural ART SG Futures Prize at Art Singapore 2026. Efflorescence/The Way We Wake, a co-created work with Rajni Perera is currently on view at the 61st Venice Biennale, In Minor Keys, by Koyo Kouoh.  She maintains an active studio practice and gratefully resides in Treaty 7 Territory, in Mohkinstsis/Calgary.

Raya Simpao (b. 2003, Manila, Philippines; lives and works in Brooklyn, NY, USA) grew up in Manila and moved to the United States, a dramatic shift in environment that sparked a deep curiosity about the possibilities of figurative painting. The foundation of her practice is a thoughtful, intentional seeing. For Simpao, painting begins with a sincere awareness of one’s surroundings. Her work serves as a record of time spent with a place, a person, or an idea. As she builds images, she draws from memories of the familiar as well as from encounters with the unfamiliar. Most formal decisions within the work such as shape, color, and light, explore the space between naturalistic and synthetic, often pushing the boundaries between the two. The paintings are often tonally ambiguous and spatially dynamic. We are introduced to each scene through a lens deliberately shaped by the artist's unique sensitivities, experiences, and instincts. At the heart of her practice is an ethic of care. Simpao considers the act of seeing– of looking closely, looking again, and looking with intention–as a form of labor that must be sustained by profound and persistent care. 

Simpao received her BFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2026 and was an attendee of the Yale Norfolk School of Art in 2025. She was a recipient of the Florence Leif award and the 2026 Spring Innovate Grant. Simpao has been featured by a number of arts platforms such as Nicotine Magazine, The Hopper Prize, House House Magazine, and Booooooom.

Daniel Cabrillos Jacobsen (b. 1996, Copenhagen, Denmark; lives and works between Atlanta, GA, US and Copenhagen) is a Danish–Filipino artist, born and raised in Copenhagen, Denmark. He earned a BFA from the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague in 2023. In 2024, he was nominated for the Royal Award for Modern Painting at the Royal Palace Amsterdam—one of the Netherlands’ most prestigious prizes for emerging painters. He is currently based in Atlanta, pursuing an MFA at the Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design at Georgia State University.

iris yirei hu (b. 1991, Los Angeles, CA, USA; lives and works in Los Angeles) is a multidisciplinary journey-based artist working across painting, installation, intercultural collaboration, writing, and public art. Her work is rooted in material and spiritual transformation, probing grief, cycles of life and death, and the self as it evolves and relates across cultures, generations, and geographies. In 2022, LA Metro commissioned her to design what will be the largest mosaic by a single artist in the region’s transit system at the future D Line Westwood/UCLA station. Her work has been exhibited at venues including the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; The Armory Show; Center for Arts, Research, and Alliances; Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson; Plug In ICA; and John Michael Kohler Arts Center. Her honors include: Ruffin Distinguished Artist-in-Residence at the University of Virginia (2026), Longenecker-Roth Artist-in-Residence at UC San Diego (2025), Kohler Arts/Industry Residency in Pottery (2025), California Community Foundation Fellowship for Visual Artists (2022), California Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship (2021), and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2018, 2020). Her writing has appeared in Amerasia Journal and her work has been reviewed in the Los Angeles Times, Artforum, CARLA, and Hyperallergic, among others.