Meet Luis Antonio Pichardo of DSTL Arts

Today we’d like to introduce you to Luis Antonio Pichardo.

Luis Antonio, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My introduction to art came from my being a restless child, and to curb my restlessness, my mom gave me paper and pencils to keep me occupied as she did her daily chores around the house. I remember taking to drawing and art like a fish to water. It kept me occupied, and eventually, became my escape. Growing up in the 80s and early 90s in my hometown, Vista, CA, there weren’t many opportunities for me to go out and experience culturally relevant activities for me, the child of a small, Mexican family. And frequent gang activity in my neighborhood didn’t always make public spaces a desirable place to be either. The park closest to my home was known to be a place where drugs were sold and worse. With all of that in mind, my mom encouraged me to find an outlet through art.

With time, I imagined myself growing up and becoming a comic book artist, or perhaps an illustrator for cartoons. In middle school I began to illustrate a comic strip for the school newspaper, but my sense of humor wasn’t very well developed, and with my parents’ divorce in 7th grade, whatever bit of humor I had left was gone, leaving me with a deep sadness and sense of responsibility as the new man of the house. I began taking my occasional weekend job with my dad as his assistant landscaper much more serious, and I began using whatever little bit of money I earned to help feed myself and my younger brother and baby sister. Drawing became something I did during class to distract myself from everything, and ultimately, to express the pain I felt inside.

By high school, I found a voice within Hip-Hop music that represented me; and the aesthetics of Hip-Hop culture made me embrace new ways of approaching my art. I continued to work, providing for my family as best I could, but I began to imagine myself as an all-around artist in the same way many of my favorite rappers portrayed themselves. From drawing graffiti-inspired illustrations, I began to develop a taste for writing rhymes, which eventually led me to explore the roots of Rap as an art form. From studying the origins of Hip-Hop, I was exposed to the work of spoken-word artists and Jazz musicians, including Gil-Scott Heron, Nikki Giovanni, and more. Their approach to poetry and empowerment inspired me to think of my art as having a place within my community, my culture.

With minimal personal motivation, I graduated high school, and really only imagined myself going into the workforce as my parents did. My dad, being an immigrant from México, didn’t have more than a few years of formal education, so he didn’t expect, much less know how, to motivate me to go to college. My mom, a first-generation Chicana, finished her high school education just before I was born, according to her, because she didn’t want me to grow up and use the excuse that she dropped out of school as my excuse for not attaining a diploma too. With that kind of background, I had no guidance after graduation. All I knew was work. All my family knows is work. But, after quitting a job I hated at a shoe store, and suffering what now I recognize as severe depression, I really didn’t know what to do with myself.

One day, not long after having quit my job, my mom told me she wanted to go to the store, and she invited me along. I agreed to go, since I wasn’t doing anything with myself that was productive. I tagged along. It turned out that the store was, in fact, Palomar College, my local community college. My mom tricked me into going to school. I wasn’t bothered by the prospect of going to college. Many of my friends in high school had talked about it, but I never thought it would be something I could do because of our lack of money as a family. After speaking with counselors at Palomar College, I learned of some resources that could potentially help me with funding my education, and it began to seem like a real possibility for me. I began looking at the course catalog, and I figured: I could either study Art and become a better visual artist, or I could go into English, learn more about poetry, and perhaps inspire kids as an English teacher, just like my English teacher inspired me when I was in my final years of high school. Ms. Gerrent, or Ms. G as she liked her students calling her, was the only person in my life, during that time that took time to listen to me, not by expecting me to speak, but by looking at my artwork, my drawings and poetry, and talking to me about growing up quickly. She was the only person who showed me sincere empathy, and the only person to tell me that I would be okay.

As I sat at Palomar College, I thought, “What am I going to do with a degree in Art? How would I find a job afterwards? At least with an English degree, I can develop my writing more, and I can always fall back on teaching as a career.” That was when I decided to pursue a formal education in writing. After enrolling in school, I learned that I didn’t qualify for any financial aid, and although I had saved enough money from my previous job to pay for my first semester of classes, I needed to find a job immediately to help me pay for books, parking, and subsequent semesters. As a prospective teacher, I began looking for jobs in the education field, particularly jobs that would give me teaching experience, and that’s when I discovered the nonprofit sector.

My first job after high school, while at Palomar College, was as a Student Aide for the YMCA. I worked with privileged kids in an affluent community, essentially in a daycare environment, after school. I mentored them and exposed them to my reality growing up, teaching them that their lives were valuable as agents of change, and that they should always show compassion to others who are less fortunate than them. Their parents, most of whom were from working-class backgrounds and who happened to “make it,” appreciated my approach to working with their kids, but since I needed to earn more, I took on a second job as a tutor for youth who were enrolled at a continuation school in Escondido. During after-school hours, I worked with privileged kids, and later, in the evenings, I worked with teens who were either parents or on probation, and in some cases, both. The disparity of the two worlds I navigated made me realize that the education system I was studying to be a part of wasn’t the only way of teaching and empowering youth.

As time went on, I became less interested in becoming a teacher, and more focused on developing my skills as an illustrator and poet. While sitting in class, both at Palomar College, and eventually Cal State San Marcos, I would fill page after page in my sketchbooks with illustrations that reflected my mood, my depression, and my inspirations from Hip-Hop. My poetry flourished. The more I read, the more I learned about critical theory and philosophy, the more my voice began to come through in my writing. I learned to speak for myself and to represent my critiques of society, my community, and my purpose as an artist. I graduated from Cal State San Marcos with a BA in Literature and Writing, with a Writing Emphasis, and a minor in Ethnic Studies, in spite of having to work three jobs, concurrently, including a short-lived night job as a janitor, throughout my time in school. I received no financial aid, but still managed to earn enough to pay for school out-of-pocket and help my family with our daily expenses as much as possible. I essentially raised my little sister the entire time because my parents were always working to provide. My mom, whom we lived with, was rarely around because of her two jobs, and my dad, whom we visited on the weekends, was usually working half the time we visited so that he could provide for himself and us at least one meal out on the town while we stayed with him. I appreciated everything they did for me, and graduating from college became my way of showing them how much I appreciated their sacrifices.

After graduating college, I was almost immediately offered a job with the agency that I worked for as a tutor for at-risk youth. The job offer came to me at a time when I became interested in pursuing an advanced degree. I was exploring the possibilities of either earning a Master’s Degree in Latin American Studies, or a Master in the Fine Arts in Creative Writing. I felt compelled to learn more about poetry and publishing, while also deeply inspired to explore the root causes of my community’s disenfranchisement and more. In the end, I took the job, which was a three year contract, and was convinced that working to save for my higher education would be a good idea.

I learned a great deal while working for that nonprofit. Escondido Education COMPACT has an amazing executive director, and Patty Huerta taught me how to be a leader in the fullest sense. Her leadership showed me how to plan, coordinate, and execute strategic partnerships for the betterment of my community. I taught classes and workshops, I helped teens and young adults develop skills that would help them launch careers, and I mentored young men and women that perhaps would not have had a positive, male role model in their lives otherwise. I, above all, learned the power of quality mentorship during my time there.

As my third year working for Education COMPACT came to a close, I renewed my search for graduate schools, this time with a commitment to my craft as a poet. During my post-college time in the workforce, I continued to draw and paint, but my poetry became crucial for my survival. I formed a writer’s group with some friends, and that helped me stay focused on developing my craft, while also helping me combat my persistent depression and stress. My family started to become more stable, financially, but with my brother now entering the college life, my income helped in other areas. With the deaths of my maternal grandparents during my first and second year after college, whatever savings I had accrued were gone, as I helped pay for funeral costs. And with a case of identity theft, my mom and I were unable to make payments to her mortgage on time. She eventually lost the house we were living in because of predatory loans during the economic downturn of the mid-2000s, and that left my family essentially homeless. At this same time, I had been accepted to grad school at CalArts, and I was preparing to move to Los Angeles to start my graduate degree. My community of writers, and my growing list of publication credits and awards in poetry, plus a couple of exhibitions of my art, had me feeling good about the direction my creative career was going in, but my family life was taking a toll on me.

In 2008, I moved to L.Á. and started my M.F.A program at CalArts. My family, at this point, had to learn to adapt without my income and my being there. My little sister took it hard, and my mom probably took it harder. My dad was as supportive as he could be, providing a place for my brother and sister to stay while my mom found a way to become more stable housing-wise. In the meantime, I worked a full-time night job at Home Depot, and a part-time job at Best Buy to cover my tuition and other expenses related to the debt I carried over from having to make house payments, even though they still resulted in the foreclosure of our home. I tried to explain my situation to my instructors at CalArts, and the financial aid office, but there was no support to be given. I had to deal with it on my own, as always.

As I worked through my first year at CalArts, I quickly learned that the “mentorship” that my M.F.A. program promised was not a mentorship at all. I was denied access to graphic design classes that I asked about before enrolling, classes which I was “guaranteed” to have access to, according to all of the CalArts staff I spoke to, and my mentor didn’t seem to realize that she had the ability to customize my curricular schedule through independent study projects that would better suit my needs and desires as a writer. That didn’t occur to her until my final days there, during my thesis review. The classes I took, not just with her, but with other instructors, also made me feel like my aesthetic as a writer of color didn’t have a place there. The topics I wrote about were often rejected as irrelevant because issues surrounding gentrification, classism, race, and ethnic identity were not “avant-garde” enough. My frankness in speaking out against issues affecting my community was looked upon as a threat, perhaps, and it definitely made me feel isolated. I considered dropping out of my M.F.A. program many times, but I stuck it out because I wanted to prove that someone like me is capable of earning a terminal degree in the Arts, in spite of how these systems are managed and perpetuated.

I graduated with my M.F.A. in Critical Studies, as CalArts calls it, and I reentered the workforce, joining a program at a local nonprofit as a case manager for adults reentering the workforce themselves. This job led to a promotion within six months, where I then became the supervisor of six after-school programs throughout Los Angeles County. I learned a great deal about the city of LA and its surrounding communities. I came to love the people here, the people who most reminded me of being back home in Vista. And I realized that I wanted to adapt my original dream of returning to Vista and establishing my own Arts-based nonprofit there, so that it would begin here, in Los Angeles, instead. I saw the support for the Arts here as crucial for the development of a mentorship program for emerging artists, like myself, whereas the minimal support for the Arts back home made me wonder if my organization would be sustainable enough to weather the first few years of being there.

Working in the nonprofit sector of Los Angeles, I eventually transitioned into an Arts-based nonprofit where I hoped to gain more experience as an Arts administrator, an area of experience I recognized I was lacking, but that experience really only showed me that even Arts-based nonprofits are limited to what they can accomplish if their programs are not focused on the development of communities through the arts, and ultimately, capitulate to education-focused programs with the Arts as a secondary feature. This experience was valuable, but I knew that there could be more.

In late-2012, I started DSTL Arts with the support of my partner, Jennifer Fuentes, who I met during our time at CalArts. She and I developed the original concept of our first program, and ultimately, the vision and mission of DSTL Arts. Our Arts Mentorship Program would be our way of inspiring, teaching, and ultimately training young artists in the entrepreneurial side of being an artist. Through our collective, negative experience with mentorships at CalArts, we knew the importance of listening to our students and adapting our curriculum to fit their needs. DSTL Arts started offering programming with three teens in our Arts Mentorship Program in February of 2013. They worked with me and Jennifer on developing their talents as poets and visual artists in my studio apartment in Echo Park. I taught them skills in painting and poetry, and I also taught basic music production and photography, skills that I taught myself throughout the years of being around other artists and creatives. We started creating works of art that would be part of our first student art showcase in June of 2013. From that time on, our Arts Mentorship Program became the program we would always use to inform the rest of our Arts-practice and pedagogy as Arts instructors.

Within a year of starting our programming, DSTL Arts became a fully incorporated nonprofit organization, and that lead to increased opportunities via grants, donations, and fundraisers. DSTL Arts remains as a small arts organization, for the time being, but our programming footprint has expanded a great deal, from originally serving only 3 teens, to now serving up to 350+ individuals annually across L.A. County, mostly in South L.A. and East/Northeast L.A., through our Arts Mentorship Program, Conchas y Café creative writing classes for adults, our Art Block Zine and zine-making workshops for artists of all ages, and our Artist Residency Workshops, which employ teaching artists from our community to teach art classes incorporating the voice of the community in the presentation of art and literary anthologies that express our community’s concerns and thoughts relating to issues affecting our city.

As an Arts organization, and now publisher, DSTL Arts is providing a platform for emerging artists from underserved and underrepresented communities in Los Angeles where they can be nurtured and inspired to share their lived experiences, learn new skills in the development of their careers as artists, and, ultimately, empowering them to benefit economically from their inherent talents. DSTL Arts, the acronym, means Develop Skills and Transcend Limits through the Arts, and it will forever be our vision as an organization. It will forever be my personal mission as I, myself, continue to practice my craft as a poet-artist; and I am forever grateful to my family and this city that has taken me into its loving embrace.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Starting DSTL Arts has not been an easy road to take. As a person who comes from a family that has always struggled to get by, financially, it was initially hard to learn how to ask for support. This includes emotional and economic support, equally. And perhaps even the timing of when I started DSTL Arts was a challenge.

One of the first actions we took when starting our organization was to solicit fiscal-sponsorship from more-established nonprofit organizations. The reasons we were rejected initially were in part due to the economic environment of 2012-2013. Nonprofit organizations were experiencing the same kind of economic hardships that most people were experiencing in their personal finances. I, myself, lost my job in 2013, and had to rely on the support of others to get by financially. The stresses that came with all of that, and the building of a base of support for my organization, did take an emotional toll on me, a toll that I didn’t realize at the time.

However, seeing that our programs were making a difference in the quality of life for our program participants kept me motivated to do the best I could, for them, and for my loved ones. I took on part-time jobs, and I began freelancing regularly as a photographer and graphic designer, all while dedicating my remaining time in the day to advancing DSTL Arts. I was able to cover some expenses of my own, but as an entrepreneur knows, it takes time before you can begin paying yourself from any start-up endeavor. My nonprofit is no different in that way.

I’m forever grateful to Jennifer Fuentes for being my primary support in the development of DSTL Arts. Her sacrifices have meant the world to me, and I know I could never repay her for that. I’m humbled by her kindness and belief in me and my vision, even though it has taken a toll on me and her. But as DSTL Arts continues to grow in recognition and impact, I know that we will see our commitment to our community growing into a genuine resource for artists like ourselves. DSTL Arts will be a part of our legacy.

Please tell us about DSTL Arts.
DSTL Arts is a nonprofit arts mentorship organization that inspires, teaches and hires emerging artists from underserved communities. Our mission statement guides all of our programs and practices. This is the core principle by which we develop our curriculum, our programming, and our partnerships. Everything we do is to provide emerging artists from underserved, and historically underrepresented, communities a platform for growth.

Our Arts Mentorship Program is our flagship program. It is open to emerging artists, ages 16 and older, who identify as individuals from underserved/underrepresented communities. This includes individuals from low income families, persons with disabilities, and current or former foster youth. We also consider immigration status, gang affiliation or impact, and other barriers to employment as individuals apply to our program. The Arts Mentorship Program nurtures emerging artists as they develop individual, creative projects in creative writing, illustration, or photography, projects they hope to publish within the course of a year. We also strive to provide guidance in other areas as well, including entrepreneurial skill development, career and educational guidance, and personal goal setting. This program is always open to new volunteers who wish to impact the life of an emerging artist through weekly, one-on-one or small group mentoring sessions. Individuals interested in participating in this program as mentees must apply.

Our zine-making programs include our Art Block Zine, which is currently a biannual publication that collects art and poetry submissions from emerging artists residing in L.A. County, ages 16 and older, and is also a workshop series that rotates on a weekly basis between various libraries in Los Angeles. Art Block Zine workshops teach mini-zine making techniques to groups of all ages, and are free for participants. Occasionally, we offer Art Block Zine workshops in partnership with other groups and organizations. To participate in our Art Block Zine workshops, feel free to follow us on social media using @DSTLArts to learn about upcoming locations and times. Emerging artists interested in submitting artwork for publication in our biannual Art Block Zine publication can submit online via our website at http://DSTLArts.org/ArtBlockZineSubmit.

Our Conchas y Café Zine is a quarterly publication that is produced through our free, 10-week bilingual creative writing classes that we offer in partnership with various libraries in Los Angeles County. The Conchas y Café creative writing classes are bilingual (English/Spanish) classes for aspiring writers, and every ten weeks we include sessions that teach mini-zine making and publishing practices that include copyright registration, understanding ISBN numbers, and self-publishing resources beyond zine-making. Every quarter, participants in our Conchas y Café program present the newest issue of the Conchas y Café Zine at a public reading that is always free, and open to the public. To learn more about upcoming sessions of our Conchas y Café creative writing classes, follow DSTL Arts on social media using @DSTLArts, or visit our website at
http://DSTLArts.org/ConchasYCafeZine

Lastly, our Artist Residency Workshops program contracts teaching artists whom reflect our community, and these artists develop a series of workshops that address social justice issues that are important to our community. Through arts-based workshops, we attempt to record concerns and empower individuals from our community as agents of change, ultimately culminating with a public presentation of their artwork developed through the workshop series, and a reading featuring an art and literary anthology that is published through this program. Every program year the theme of the workshop series changes, but the approach remains the same. For more information about our Artist Residency Workshops program, visit our website at
http://DSTLArts.org/ArtistResidencyWorkshops

DSTL Arts really makes every attempt to involve our program participants in the development of the curriculum we present, listening to them through formal and informal evaluations, and making every effort to tailor the program experiences we provide for the benefit of our community. In this way, DSTL Arts distinguishes itself from other Arts organizations. In this way, we always work toward fulfilling our mission to “inspire, teach and hire emerging artists from underserved communities.”

Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
My childhood is hard to remember in many ways, but some of the best memories that do come to mind are from my early childhood; the years before I started school and was taken care of by my maternal grandmother were the happiest moments of my life. I enjoyed the freedom of being outside, playing in dirt, climbing trees, rolling in grass, and, of course, playing with all of her animals. My Mami Lucy was the kindest, most loving person I’ve ever known. No one has matched her love in my life, and the relationship she had with my maternal grandpa, Pop, was the funniest, most admirable relationship I’ve ever experienced. They weren’t perfect, but they were the closest thing to genuine love I could ever explain.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://DSTLArts.org
• Email: info@DSTLArts.org
• Instagram: http://instagram.com/DSTLArts
• Facebook: http://facebook.com/DSTLArts
• Twitter: http://twitter.com/DSTLArts

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