Silver Eye

How do memory, images, and systems of belief shape lived experience and a sense of belonging?

These questions unfold throughout Tears, Blood, Sweat, in which Ryan Frigillana reconsiders the American Dream through intertwined histories of land, labor, and citizenship. Drawing on his experience as a first-generation Filipino American, he traces connections between his family’s past and present.

Frigillana works across multiple visual strategies in the exhibition. These include contemporary photographs that incorporate still-life compositions and collages, reworked biblical illustrations, appropriated news imagery, and intimate observations of family and place.

Together, these approaches challenge fixed narratives of migration, showing how histories, memories, and evolving ideas of faith and country shape belonging amid changing political realities.

Participating Artist

1. Ryan Frigillana (b. Iligan City, Philippines) is a lens-based artist working between Long Island, New York, and Southaven, Mississippi. Drawing from an upbringing shaped by migration and Adventism, he combines photographs with reworked materials—including print media, family and public archives, and biblical illustrations from his childhood—to address the tensions and continuities of diaspora and faith. Through books and installations, he approaches photography as a form of evidence, allegory, and prayer: as record, symbol, and confession.

   Frigillana has exhibited at Light Work, Houston Center for Photography, Blue Sky Oregon Center for the Photographic Arts, and Candela Photographic Arts. He is a recipient of the NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship in Photography (‘25), the JGS Fellowship for Photography (‘25, ‘21), the Aperture & Google Creator Labs Photo Fund (‘23), and the En Foco Photography Fellowship (‘23), and has completed residencies through the Penumbra Workspace Program (‘24) and the Penumbra Foundation Risograph Print & Publication Residency (‘21). His work has been published by Aperture, Atlanta Center for Photography, Humble Arts Foundation, Booooooom, PhMuseum, Der Greif, Musée magazine, and The New Yorker among others. He holds a BFA in Photography and Related Media (2020) from the Fashion Institute of Technology.