Philadelphia, PA – The Office of Immigrant Affairs kicked off Welcoming Week 2026 on September 10 at City Hall with Passport Through the Caribbean: Art & Artifacts Representing Caribbean Life Through the Four Pillars, an exhibition highlighting Caribbean art and cultural traditions.
The project, presented with Creative Philadelphia’s Art in City Hall program and the Mayor’s Commission on African & Caribbean Immigrant Affairs, is curated by Raeann Billey, founder and president of the Guyana Tri-State Coalition and Chamber Inc. and a member of the Caribbean United Leaders Collective.
Raeann organized the displays around four ideas she identifies as central to Caribbean life: family, food, fun and faith.
“For Caribbean people, Family is central to daily life and community,” Raeann writes in her curator’s statement. “We do not simply think in terms of ‘extended family’; we understand ourselves as one family.”
The sense of connection carries into the rest of the exhibit. Flags from Caribbean nations are shown above paintings, books, dolls, musical instruments, sports equipment, and other artifacts. The objects reflect shared experiences across the region while highlighting the distinct cultures found throughout the Caribbean.
Featured artists and authors include Leila Laraque (Piman Zwazo), Eunice LaFate, Edgard Wah, Keith Morrison, C.L.R. James, Walter Rodney, Anthony Olatunji, Mike Atherton, Victorine Grannum-Solomon and Undine Giuseppi.
Notably, the works highlight Caribbean identities beyond the Spanish-speaking islands often associated with the region.
Haitian artist Leila Laraque, known as Piman Zwazo, connects music with family memory in Jean Jean, The Drummer. The painting is named after her uncle Jean Alix Laraque, who played electric drums with Caribbean Sextet before his death in 1986.
A painting titled Jamaica by K. Sterling uses bright colors, palm trees and an island landscape to evoke a connection to place and community.
Nearby, Haitian American artist Edgard Wah turns toward intimacy in his 2006 oil painting Man in Love with his Woman. The work depicts a couple together and centers love, trust and companionship, offering a quieter expression of Caribbean life alongside the exhibit’s music and celebration.
Music is also represented through a Trinidad and Tobago steel pan display. The accompanying text traces the instrument’s development in Trinidad and Tobago and its influence on calypso and modern Caribbean music.
Celebration itself is part of Raeann’s framework. “To ‘lime,’ or simply hang out, is to gather in good company,” she writes, describing the food, conversation and music that turns everyday gathering into a shared cultural experience.
Books and references to Anansi bring storytelling into the exhibit. The West African trickster figure appears throughout Caribbean oral traditions, connecting faith, folklore and lessons passed between generations.
Altogether, the works avoid presenting the Caribbean as a single culture. They move across different islands and traditions while returning to shared themes of family, food, fun and faith.
The exhibit coincides with this year’s Welcoming Week theme, “The Courage to Connect: 250 Years of Welcome in Philly,” as Philadelphia commemorates the nation’s 250th anniversary.
Passport Through the Caribbean remains on view on the first floor of Philadelphia City Hall through October 2.
