Photo by Den Alexander.

Bio

Madjeen Isaac is a first generation Haitian-American artist whose practice is rooted in home, communality and belonging. Isaac reimagines and hybridizes landscapes that center boundless Caribbean existences, taking up space forging new realities, and experiencing the buoyancy of daily life post-migration. Pulling from elements of her hometown Brooklyn and ancestral homeland Haiti, Isaac investigates liminal spaces, unpacking feelings of being in one place while simultaneously thinking about or longing for another. She questions, how does the diaspora continue to place their trust in reimagining new realities of being? How does one reinvent home away from home?

Isaac aims to create nostalgic portals and blueprints of sovereign futures suggesting ideal worlds of access and autonomy, birthed from resistance and revolution.

Isaac received a BFA in Fine Art from the Fashion Institute of Technology and an MA in Art + Edu & Community Practice from New York University. She has had residencies/fellowships including Smack Mellon’s Artist Studio Program, BRIClab: Contemporary Artist Residency Program, the Laundromat Project Fellowship and Lakou NOU Artist Residency Program at Haiti Cultural Exchange. She has exhibited at numerous institutions including Smack Mellon, Brooklyn Museum, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute and The Frost Art Museum. In 2023 Isaac collaborated with KITH to create an Artist Series Capsule Collection in Honor of Black History Month. Isaac’s practice has been recognized and received awards including the 2024 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship for Painting and The Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation among others.