I almost didn’t make it to Love Sent Across Seas. Housed in the Penn Museum, a building that takes up an entire block, I walked to the entrance of the nearby side and was faced with nothing more than shipping entrances. To my chagrin, standing coy and clueless, I met the woman behind the video installation, Dr. Neisha Terry of Stony Brook University, who was also lost, coming from Long Island. A professor, videographer, and incentive behind the VOICE (VocalizED Identity Crafting and Exploration) Lab, I got the privilege to speak with her on my way in, granting a literal behind–the–scenes look into the exhibit.
Terry explains that the exhibit is a narrative of the immigration journey to the U.S. from five island nations in the Caribbean—Haiti, Cuba, Trinidad & Tobago, Jamaica, and Barbados—as told through various artifacts, mementos, and video work. Facilitated by the Center for Experimental Ethnography and the Caribbean Community in Philadelphia, its narrative thrust was the Caribbean immigrant tradition of sending barrels of food, toiletries, and other sundries to loved ones in their countries of origin.
Barrels painted by artists of their respective countries formed the anchor pieces of the exhibit. Notably, Dori Stewart, a PAFA grad, painted the Jamaica barrel, keeping some of the talent local. The space was further fleshed out by interactive displays, historical photographs documenting Caribbean history (notably, a picture of the robes of the King of Congo housed in a Cuban cabildo), a collection of interviews, and a smattering of goods for sale at the back.
With Caribbeans being among the largest immigrant groups from the Americas in Philadelphia, the exhibit is of particular importance to the city. Philly is home to Africatown, a thriving community of African diaspora along Woodland Avenue, along with various Caribbean restaurants and spaces scattered about (thinking about that delicious Jamaican food truck by the 34th El stop). Being in North America, we’re surrounded by Caribbean culture and products—sugar, coffee, dancehall, and reggae’s impact on music, to name a few—yet rarely recognize the people behind the craft and culture.
My best friend in high school was a first–generation Jamaican American, and I’ve spent summers witnessing her pack barrels back to her loved ones. I am still struck by the level of care and attention it took, usually being multi–day endeavors to collect all the supplies and arrange them properly in the barrel. It’s an act of paramount care, a manifestation of a loving relationship that becomes all–consuming—not just in buying and packing, but in the logistics of getting the barrel across the sea to your family and friends. It's literally a token of love, sent across international waters.
This emotional importance of the barrel packing process to Caribbean culture precipitates why I was disappointed in the exhibit. I felt the way the materials were displayed didn’t give barrel packing the same merit it has in my head and to those I care about.
First, the signs at the exhibit were in a garish blue sans–serif font, as opposed to the prestige traditional art or artifact placates frame art. These descriptions looked akin to the ones in kid's museums as if telling the viewer the process is childlike. Sure there were kids milling about and it’s important to be kid–friendly, but being placed in such a visual context trivialized a serious and honored tradition as infantile. It was only exacerbated by weirdly abutting a U2 Spy Plane exhibit, with museums like the National Air and Space Museum already conjuring up elementary school field trips. It was a framing issue where the care put into barrel packing felt cartoon–like.
There was also a lack of attention toward the show’s lens–based pieces. The photo collage from Leniqueca Welcome was printed in a way where you could still see the pixels, making her art seem of little value. There was a giant TV playing a TikTok video of someone packing a barrel, patronizing the audience, as if specifically trying to please Gen–Z. The video suggests audiences cannot understand a properly exhibited museum space without the constant stimulation social media provides.
The interviews, supposedly a way for the immigrants to profess their own journey, were reduced to raw Zoom footage stitched together, disclosed by the blurry backgrounds and up–close, awkward camera angles of computer selfies. I wish they could’ve put a little more effort into offering up their voices, giving them the respect of editing and context. Even displays of Caribbean products featured plastic food—the kind that could be found in kids’ play–kitchens. There was a lack of gravity and effort put into the display of the work, making what is a familial and intimate activity appear askance.
What turned my experience around was getting to talk to Sharon Bloomfield Hicks. Hidden in the back corner next to obviously drop–shipped Haiti merch, Hicks is a “Jamerican” (half Jamaican, half American) artist working in tuft work and painting. She reinvestigated her history by visiting Jamaica as a child, as her mother hails from a heritage of Portuguese Jews escaping the Inquisition by coming to the island. Hicks interrogated her status as Jamaican and American—contested by being an outsider in both lands—through her art. She utilized found Rastafari shoelaces and the twine from Jamaican baskets to make multimedia pieces that reminded me of El Anatsui’s work, pieces that spoke to her working through her dichotomous identity. Hicks' pieces, self–admittedly, were imbued with the vibrancy and joyfulness of the Caribbean. At the same time, they possess the formal qualities of artists housed in the Barnes Foundation, where she previously worked, with the exploitation of the picture plan plucked from Matisse or Cézanne.
What still gave me faith about the exhibit, however, was the strength of the community found at the event. Everyone seemed to know someone there, with smiles, laughter, and hugs all around. There was amazing catering bringing us together, a pour–your–own juice bar, and a rum tasting to help people mingle and cheer. At the coffee stand, I had a warm conversation with curator and CCP Founding President Miranda Alexander about the relevance of the exhibit and why it matters so much to the people depicted. It felt especially pertinent in the backdrop of the most recent election, given just how much it will affect immigration and immigrant communities.
In that vein, Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell spoke on the ways Philadelphia has tried to care for the Caribbean community in years past, including the development of the Commission on African and Caribbean Immigrants Affairs to protect the city's African and Caribbean residents. Blackwell elaborated on the ongoing difficulties Caribbean Americans face in Philly, especially the ongoing threats of the Philadelphia Police Department and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) they face. Still, she inspired hope in us all by talking about the vibrant creativity Africatown is bringing to an oft–ignored region of the city, transforming the area around the airport into a commercial and vivacious area.
A word that echoed throughout the many speeches was "care." It reverberated throughout the space, feeling particularly relevant given the subject matter of the exhibit. To foster a generation of people who care for each other, to transform ourselves collectively beyond what pressures we may face. It was a reminder that love must persist among the turbulent seas.
