Pintô International is pleased to announce Our Islands, Their People: Becoming Archipelago, the first of a novel program of exhibitions that will spark conversations between Filipino contemporary artists, and their counterparts in the Americas and Caribbean who share a similar colonial past.

Drawing from Our Islands and Their People, as Seen with Camera and Pencil (1899) a book that first highlighted the parallels between the Philippines and other countries subjected to Spanish and American colonization, this exhibition connects artistic practices that explore indigenous identity, today. All the artists included in the show—Shiraz Bayjoo, Maia Cruz Palileo, Nicholas Galanin, Caroline Garcia, Alejandro Garcia Contreras, Cannupa Hanska Luger, Ulrik Lopez, Leeroy New, Sara Jimenez, Miguel Angel Payano Jr., Eric Zamuco—variously undertake an identitarian voyage to reimagine fluid notions of being indigenous to a place. In doing so, they deconstruct and elaborate on their distinctive homeland’s visual and material heritage. Through a cross-cultural lens, the works here included layer local mythologies, symbols, and beliefs with personal memories and popular culture, in order to resist strict geographical and ethnic categorizations.