To honor Caribbean American Heritage Month, Bridgeport native Nilsa Laine is curating her first art exhibition, bringing together 11 artists from across New England to celebrate Caribbean culture and community through art.
The month-long exhibition titled “Underrepresented Celebrations” is being held at the Art Barn located on Bryant University’s campus in Smithfield, Rhode Island, which Bryant describes as a venue for community members to “share in, appreciate, and expand” the arts. It will feature emerging professional and student artists working across a variety of mediums, including painting, photography, textiles, mixed media and digital illustration. For Laine, the exhibit is both a personal experience and a way to honor the cultures that connect Caribbean communities.
Laine said curating an exhibition has been a long-term goal of hers. While she originally imagined herself doing a project like this after earning a Ph.D., she decided there was no reason to wait. For her first time curating, she wanted to create something that was both fun and intriguing, and because much of her interest centers around cultural identity, celebrating Caribbean American Heritage Month felt like a good place to begin.
The experience, she said, has been rewarding but challenging.
“It was a fun and enlightening experience, but naturally stressful,” Laine said.
Full-time, Laine works as a community director, a job that requires more than a typical 9-to-5. But, alongside her career, much of her free time has gone towards planning for the exhibition, coordinating with artists, and preparing for the show itself.
Finding artists, however, seemed to be easier than expected.
“The first outreach was people agreeing,” Laine said.
She reached out to artists she admired, Caribbean creatives she discovered through social media and others she met at events and pop-up tables.
As Laine went through the developing process of the exhibition, she considered whether or not each artwork needed to explicitly portray Caribbean culture. Ultimately, she came to a different approach.
“I asked myself, do I want all the work to have a narrative of Caribbean culture?” she said. “But at the end of the day, the artists are Caribbean or of Caribbean descent; they are the culture.”
One of those artists is Marina Hernandez, a painter also from Bridgeport who is currently living and backpacking throughout England. Although she has explored art since she was young, she only began pursuing art more seriously in recent years.
“I had this idea for a long time that painting was just not anything serious, but that wasn’t really my belief,” she said. “It was just a thought that had been put on me, but I love doing it and it makes me very happy.”
Working primarily with oil and acrylic on canvas, Hernandez described her featured art as a reflection of different periods in her life and the evolution of her artistic style.
“I put everything of myself into it, and I let it be free,” she said. “In return, it frees me as well.”
For her, art is more than self-expression; it’s also a way of connecting with others.
“Caribbean people have gone through a lot,” Hernandez said. “Art is combative to trauma.”
Representation is a major focus point. Laine said she has seen how the arts can sometimes be overlooked, and believes that both art and cultural communities deserve spaces where their stories and identities can be celebrated, but beyond celebrating artists, Laine hopes the exhibition will have a lasting impact on the community. She views art as a form of activism and a tool for healing, capable of bringing people together across differences.
“Art is a universal language,” she said. “People shouldn’t be afraid to celebrate who they are.”
Laine added, “We are all connected by food, by music, by art.”
Laine hopes the space will allow visitors to celebrate Caribbean culture in a welcoming and visually engaging way and hopes the exhibition will be a space for people to enjoy culture, to have fun, and to understand the deeper meanings of cultural identity in a beautiful context.
To learn more about the exhibit, which runs through June 30, visit Bryant University’s Art Barn Instagram page or website.
