Equity In Art

Poetry Celebrating Community and Culture

_{By Dave DeOreo, September 2020}

Mexican-American performance poet and actor Andrew Valdez is creating art and poetry to celebrate Cleveland's Latinx community. [Steve Wagner]

Editor’s note: Recognizing artists of color face barriers in the art world, the Equity In Art series seeks to amplify the work of minority artists. Through this series, ideastream will profile artists of various genres living and working in Northeast Ohio. Look for a new profile each Wednesday in September at arts.ideastream.org.

Read other stories in the series.

Inside his Collinwood apartment, Andrew Valdez is creating piñatas in the shapes of a home and the people who live there. The work is both celebratory and representative of people living in communities like Cleveland that are home to immigrants from Puerto Rico and Latin American nations.

He weaves colorful strips of paper onto the piñatas, meant to symbolize “the Latinx people who have lived in these areas, and/or were pushed out, or in the areas where there's a large Latinx population,” he said.

Originally from Texas, Valdez now calls Cleveland home, and he creates art here in a variety of mediums, including theater and poetry.

Andrew Valdez creating piñatas [AKC Photography]

Amazed by Applause

"What got me through it was people cheering me on and people clapping."

Andrew Valdez performs at the University of Texas in 2017. [Lawrence Peart]

Valdez realized in elementary school that he loved to perform in front of an audience.

Growing up in the Texas border town of Donna, one of his earliest memories is dancing in the living room to the popular hit from 2000, NSYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye.”

He created his own choreography for the song and decided to perform it at his school’s talent show.

“I believe I was in first or second grade,” Valdez said. “I remember the cheers and the applause being the biggest motivating factor, because when I was up there, I was terrified. What got me through it was people cheering me on and people clapping. I think that is my earliest memory of the feeling you get when you create art and how community is so central to its reception."

Important Mentor

“He took me under his wing and taught me the ropes."

Andrew Valdez (second from left) at Donna High School banquet with drama club students and Guadalupe Ibarra (far right) in 2011

Andrew Valdez with his extended family of cousins, nieces and nephew in 2010

Andrew Valdez with his extended family of cousins, nieces and nephew in 2010

Valdez, who stands more than 6 feet tall, played basketball in high school. He also joined the drama club, initially as a way to get a fine arts credit. During his first performance with the club, he said he rediscovered “the applause that I didn’t find when I was playing basketball.”

Andrew Valdez (seated far right) with Donna High School Drama Club and Guadalupe Ibarra (far right) in 2012

Andrew Valdez (seated far right) with Donna High School Drama Club and Guadalupe Ibarra (far right) in 2012

He also found a mentor in the drama department, director Guadalupe Ibarra.

“[Ibarra] took me under his wing and taught me the ropes of what it meant to be performing, especially to make theater as an artist,” he said.

Billy Rey Alaniz, Guadalupe Ibarra and Andrew Valdez in 2010

Billy Rey Alaniz, Guadalupe Ibarra and Andrew Valdez in 2010

Ibarra encouraged him to enter a state monologue competition. Valdez prepared and felt confident going into the contest, but his nerves got the best of him.

Andrew Valdez, Vanessa Faticati and Billy Rey Alaniz at Texas Monologue Competition in 2011

Andrew Valdez, Vanessa Faticati and Billy Rey Alaniz at Texas Monologue Competition in 2011

After he tripped up on the monologue, he retreated outside to “grieve over” his loss. Ibarra searched Valdez out and consoled him.

“He told me it didn't matter who had seen my monologue or in what moment they saw it in, because they saw it in a moment that it was incomplete. But he and I had seen the journey to this monologue, had seen my growth from that moment all the way into this moment where I was performing and that there was plenty more growth to continue," he said. "So when I finally made that realization, I think that's when I felt like an artist."

Life as Latinx

"I believe that no one is illegal."

Andrew Valdez (third from left) with Donna High School Drama Club friends Mando Gonzalez, Juan Ariaga and Hiram Orozco in 2010

Growing up, Valdez didn’t have much experience outside of his hometown of Donna, Texas, a predominantly Mexican-American community in the Rio Grande Valley.

His first opportunity to venture outside his hometown came during a student exchange program that took him to Germany. On his return trip home he changed planes in London’s Heathrow airport. While using the restroom he couldn’t find a working soap dispenser, trying each one in vain.

A man approached him and said very slowly, “the soap dispenser doesn’t work.” The man repeated the phrase again slowly, assuming Valdez didn’t speak English. Once he figured out what the man was up to, Valdez told him he spoke English. The shared embarrassment of that moment stuck with him as an initial exposure to discrimination. He never told anyone about that painful moment until college.

“We were asked to devise this little movement sequence about a moment from our childhood that still lingers with us…I created a movement piece to it, and in creating that movement piece I found a way to heal from it,” he said.

Heathrow Airport [Shutterstock:IR Stone]

Expressing feelings about discrimination through art has helped Valdez mature as an artist. Another experience, which he later wrote a poem about, took place while attending the University of Texas in Austin in 2017.

After an evening jog in a local park, Valdez returned to his car to discover the parking lot was locked and he couldn’t get out. He asked a security guard to help him, who in turn called the sheriff. Soon three police vehicles were on the scene.

“I explain my situation, that I just came out for a jog and that I'm just trying to go home,” he said.

After some back and forth, one of the cops offered Valdez a deal.

He said the officer told him they wouldn’t search his car, as long as Valdez promised them he wasn’t smuggling a cousin in the trunk.

“After that exchange, I bit my tongue even though I wanted to bite back,” he said.

The subsequent poem - “Stuck in Overtime” - allowed him to process some of those feelings.

“I thought about how scared I was and how nervous and how uncomfortable… about my cousin being in the trunk of my car. All the police officers were white and their unison laughter at that comment, it was how all of that made me feel,” he said.

Written in 2017, Valdez recently updated the poem in light of current events.

"Stuck in Overtime" by Andrew Valdez (page 1)

"Stuck in Overtime" by Andrew Valdez (page 2)

"Stuck in Overtime" by Andrew Valdez (page 3)

"Stuck in Overtime" by Andrew Valdez (page 4)

Andrew Valdez performs a selection from "Stuck in Overtime."

Valdez said he has seen such discriminatory rhetoric increase since the 2016 presidential election and feels it’s his job as an artist to be more inclusive as a response.

“I definitely believe that has intensified my own voice in my own search for amplifying the Latinx voices, and my own voice and my experience of what it is like to have an individual in such pristine and esteemed power have such detrimental views of my community as a whole. And so I feel that that has sparked within me, a need, a need for advocacy and the need to debunk all of these myths or the hateful spite that has been placed upon this community to give them a bad rap,” Valdez said.

That kind of dialogue and the political backlash against Latinx Americans is disheartening, he said, especially accusations of being an illegal immigrant.

“I really dislike that narrative. I believe that no one is illegal,” he said. “I am actively engaging in ways that me, myself and the people who are within my sphere of influence, are practicing through measures of inclusivity. I think that's where it begins. I think that's where my hope lies, is that through effort it will grow,” he said.

Coming to Cleveland

"[The Latinx] identity does live here ... it is abundant and should be celebrated."

Andrew Valdez with girlfriend Allyse Corbin, Uncle Vaughn Cox and Aunt Juanita Valdez-Cox

As college graduation neared, Valdez looked for opportunities with other Latinx communities where he could grow as an artist.

A playwriting assignment helped lead him from Texas to Cleveland. During his research he discovered Cleveland Public Theater’s Latino company, Teatro Público, and created a class presentation about the group.

Later, when it was time to start applying for jobs, he learned of an opening at CPT, “and I grew very excited,” he said.

Valdez was hired at CPT in 2017, and he went on to become one of its Premiere Fellows in 2019, working as an actor, director, playwright and poet.

One of the productions there that continues to resonate for Andrew is 2018’s “American Dreams,” where he played one of three contestants vying for the opportunity to become an American citizen in the setting of a fictional game show.

Valdez also works as a Cleveland Play House CARE Teaching Artist for K-8 students at Walton Elementary in the Clark-Fulton neighborhood.

The program uses theater to teach students about empathy.

“[We ask] them in what ways can we approach feeling sad, angry, scared or happy and express those emotions, empathetically, given into context that it is okay to be angry, but it is not okay to take out our anger on other people,” he said.

Since the start of the pandemic, Valdez has created Instagram instructional videos for his students.

This spring Valdez was selected for one of Julia de Burgos Cultural Arts Center’s Support for Artists grants underwritten by Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.

Since the pandemic forced artists to perform online, he’s been hosting Voces Fuertes, a bi-weekly open mic for Latinx artists and other artists of color.

Valdez concludes his residency by collaborating with Twelve Literary Arts for a series called Ekphrastacy, where local Cleveland artists create original work inspired by visual art by area Latinx artists.

The event, Voces Unidas, takes place September 24, at 6 p.m. online at the Julia De Burgos Cultural Arts Center's YouTube Channel and Facebook page.

Meanwhile Valdez is busy creating piñatas as part of his residency at the Julia De Burgos Cultural Arts Center. The piñatas, in the shapes of a house and people, acknowledge, “that this [Latinx] identity does live here and that it is abundant and should be celebrated,” he said.

Julia de Burgos Cultural Arts Center plans to unveil the piñatas Valdez creates during a Hispanic Heritage Month program Saturday, September 19. Valdez will hand out DIY kits for children to create their own piñatas at the center’s annual Dia de Los Muertos celebration. The kits will include a poem by Valdez.

2019/2020 Cleveland Public Theatre Premiere Fellows Andrew Valdez, Aaron Benson, Sheffia Randall Dooley, Les Hunter, Jimmie Woody, and CPT Executive Artistic Director Raymond Bobgan. [Steve Wagner]

Andrew Valdez in Teatro Publico's "A Xmas Cuento Remix" in 2019 [Steve Wagner]

Imran Sheikh, Ali Andre Ali, Andrew Valdez, Jens Rasmussen, Leila Buck in Cleveland Public Theatre’s American Dreams by Leila Buck in 2018 [Steve Wagner]

Putting Down Roots

“I would say that community and compassion are at the center of what I do."

Andrew Valdez and his family at Euclid Avenue Arcade in 2019. From left to right: Uncle Vaughn Cox, Andrew Valdez, Aunt Juanita Valdez-Cox, sister Monica Luna, mother Erma Luna, sister Maribelle Luna and brother-in-law Paz Elizondo

Valdez recently moved to the Waterloo Arts District with the intention of remaining in the Cleveland artistic community.

“I would say that community and compassion are at the center of what I do,” he said. “I like to do art that is interactive. I like to subvert expectations and think about what is the way that I can get the community to help tell this story with me as opposed to me telling the story for the community."

Direct interaction with the local community is essential to Valdez and his creativity.

“I like to view my art as a way to actively have conversation with the community and get them to engage in art in ways they are not typically used to engaging in anywhere,” he said. “I find that the most exciting thing for me with live performances.”

Since arriving in Northeast Ohio in 2017 and then working for Cleveland Public Theatre, Cleveland Play House and Julia de Burgos, Valdez said he is finding his identity as an artist.

“Living here in Cleveland, I have found that [artistic] balance more so than in any other community I've been a part of,” he said.

Allyse Corbin and Andrew Valdez outside the Beachland Ballroom in Waterloo Arts District in 2019

Billy Rey Alaniz and Andrew Valdez in 2019

Andrew Valdez with his Uncle Vaughn Cox and Aunt Juanita Valdez-Cox outside Cleveland Public Theater in 2017