March 21, 2026. Spring is settling in. The sun shines, sweeping away the last chills of a lingering winter. At 4623 North Clark Street, in Chicago, this new light coincides with the culmination of a project: the inauguration of the permanent premises of the Haitian American Museum of Chicago (HAMOC).

At the entrance, between an easel where a painting is being created by four hands and guests armed with smartphones, Elsie Hector Hernandez, founder and CEO of HAMOC, assisted by Carlos Bossard, program director, cuts a ribbon in the national colors. A burst of applause erupts, mingled with the beat of a drum, the sound of the lanbi konen by Mecca Aka Grimo, and an ayibobo rising from the depths of Haitian Viking. The echo seems to go beyond Chicago, resonating all the way to Haiti.