Artist’s Statement - Lessons From Abuelita….

My earliest artistic memories are rooted at a writing table I shared with my grandmother, Carmen Luisa Justiniano, an accomplished Puerto Rican poet who began self-publishing in her 50s. 

I would watch her meticulously fill legal pads with stories from her childhood en el campo de Puerto Rico—written in black felt-tip pen, each word a meditation. Through her, I fell in love with language, with performance, and with being Puerto Rican. Her 500-page autobiography Con Valor y a Cómo de Lugar: Memorias de una Jíbara Puertorriqueña—a singular cultural document—sits quietly on shelves across the country, largely unknown outside our family and community. This invisibility fueled my desire to become a storyteller and performer. But more than that, it ignited a lifelong commitment to challenge the systems that decide which stories matter, who gets to tell them, and who gets to hear them.

Latiné stories remain disproportionately underrepresented on stages and screens. They are often flattened into harmful tropes that erase our complexity and joy when they appear. As an artist and leader, I have built my own avenues—crafting work with Teatro Luna, UrbanTheater Company, Free Street Theater, and 2nd Story, and performing across genres to lift narratives that go beyond visibility toward affirmation and self-determination. I’ve lived a “double life” as a nonprofit leader, applying the lessons of theatre-making to create policy initiatives, youth development programs, and cultural strategies rooted in equity and access. I even founded a consulting practice rooted in these principles.

But artmaking is my vocation, my meditation, and my offering. With every piece I craft, every class I teach, and every initiative I lead, I work toward a world where our voices are not just included but essential. My art is an offering of cultural affirmation, collective catharsis, and joyful resistance—woven firmly into the fabric of our collective experiences in this country.