Spotlight Conversation with Delia Rodriguez-Masjoan, Founder and President of EcoArts USA

“Our favorite part of being in the Rhode Island Expansion Arts Program is belonging to a community that supports our creative work. Through the RIEAP we learn from each other, access resources, and reach new audiences. It also provides the space to organize your work, seek potential funding, and opportunities to grow as individuals and as an organization.”- Delia Rodriguez-Masjoan

Delia Rodriguez-Masjoan is a woman who wears many hats in the work she does within the Ocean State. Her genuine unapologetic passion for everything she spearheads is what makes her so dynamic and a staple in the communities she operates within. Whether it is engaging her local community, advocating for BIPOC individuals, or facilitating safe spaces for artists to express themselves, Delia has proven that this is her life’s purpose.

Raised in Cordoba, Argentina, Delia is a proud Latina and widely recognized as a leader in the Hispanic/Latinx community. From being a talk show host on Spanish radio, to helping immigrants get rights, or developing creative spaces for arts and culture, she has been a trailblazer and a reliable voice for three decades.

The love for her people has overflowed into other intersecting interests; including women’s rights, empowering her community to participate in the democratic process, creating art and cultural spaces and experiences with multiethnic communities, equal educational opportunities,  empowering communities of color to make their voice heard, and participating in community development.

Delia has founded several organizations including an immigration advocacy organization, a Latina leadership program, an arts and cultural exchange program, and most recently, a community design and print studio. She is a passionate, creative, and driven relationship builder who strives for a community that is diverse, inclusive, and accessible to all.

RIEAP:  Tell us about EcoArts USA and your involvement in the community?

Delia:  EcoArts USA is an arts and cultural exchange organization led by Latino, Afro-Cuban and African American cultural development professionals from the United States.

Our mission is to support, coordinate and lead arts, cultural and educational exchange programs between artists of color from the United States and diverse artists in Cuba and from around the world, by cultivating, promoting, and documenting their talent, creativity, and magic to tell their own stories and histories.

Our vision is that our international arts and cultural exchange program is an honest person-to person engagement which encourages communication and dialogue to promote better understanding of other cultures among people from diverse countries, races, and ethnicities as they come together for a profound and sustained engagement among artists and between artists and audiences.

Our team is composed of talented artists along with arts and cultural promoters who have been working in the community for the past 20 years. Our background is a catalyst that brings together talent to develop programming with and for communities of color. We are Artists and Cultural Development Professionals with diverse art and cultural backgrounds, disciplines and talents which include performing arts, music, visual art as well as media, social media, and digital productions with 20 years of experience in the art and cultural equity world.

RIEAP: How does your organization create an international arts and cultural exchange between artists from the United States and Cuba? 

Delia:  Our organization started with Cuba in 2015. We connected directly with Cuban artists and arts organizations and began forging and strengthening partnerships with artists and arts organizations of color from the United States to create a program that had cultural equity, sustainability, inclusion, and diversity.

Why Cuba? It is no surprise that with the doors of diplomacy opening between the US and Cuba, back in 2015, this created a great deal of interest by everyone, both here and there, to learn from each other. Americans were fascinated and wanted to visit Cuba “before the changes”, however, we saw how the magic and beauty of Cuba was directly connected to the people and their stories. We decided that the best way to connect with another country was by meeting directly with people through the arts, cultural conversation, and convening, thus we created a program that offered direct people-to people, artist-to artists, artist-to-community component, essential to successful international exchange programs.

RIEAP: You have produced various movies including “La Soga 2”. What was that experience like?

Delia:  EcoArts USA was involved in the promotion of the documentary “Councilwoman”, a real-life story of Councilwoman Carmen Castillo and her rise from working in a hotel to being elected Councilwoman in Providence, RI. A couple of years later, we were asked to support the production of an international film, “La Soga 2”, which was filmed and produced in Rhode Island. La Soga 2 is a suspenseful action drama that follows Luis Valerio, a former hitman from the Dominican Republic, as he battles federal agents, powerful cartels, and his own conscience in a quest to uncover the truth about his missing wife Jenny. The movie was written, produced, and starred Dominican Actor Manny Perez, and the crew was comprised of many local artists and actors with an array of talents. We have been selected to premier the movie at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 10th, 2021. We look forward to showcasing the movie in Rhode Island, sometime in November. So, stay tuned! (Click here to see La Soga 2 trailer)

RIEAP: What new activities/programs can people look forward to seeing from EcoArts USA in 2021 and beyond?

Delia:  EcoArts USA is always looking for ways to support local multicultural and multiethnic arts and cultural programs. We do this work through the creative connections we have developed over time. Last year we supported Satta Jallah with the production of Holistic Roots, where Satta provided a series of activities highlighting Afro art and culture.

This year we sponsored a series of talks during Black History Month, with Black History Scholar Marco A. McWilliams. McWilliams is the Associate Director of Education and Training at The Center for Reconciliation. He is a public scholar, published writer, and an activist with nearly two decades of engaged scholarship work in convening diverse learning communities. McWilliams was the founding instructor of the influential Black Studies program at DARE (Direct Action for Rights and Equality), where his teaching focused on using the Black Radical Tradition as a point of departure to design strategies for social change. He presented a 4-part series during Black History month in which EcoArts USA helped produce, promote, and create the posters for these talks.

RIEAP: You are creating a new community print shop in Providence called “Counterform”. Can you tell us more about this and what you will be offering?

Delia:   I am super excited about our new Community Design and Print Studio: Counterform! This project was born from the talent, passion and dream of my AMAZING friends, artists and creative placemakers; Jacques, Jose and Tati.

During the pandemic, we started to think about creating our own space that could be shared with the community we come from and live in…. the talent was there, the ideas had been flowing in for a while, so we needed to sit down and plan our strategy. We reached out to our community of artists and arts organizations to present our idea and develop relationships that would support our initial steps. Immediately, The Steel Yard stepped in and provided us the support we needed to get going.

Our first step was coming up with the concept of what we wanted to do and who we wanted to be, and that is how we came up with our name “Counterform: Community Design & Print Studio”.

Counterform offers strategic design and printing services through research and community engagement. This initiative aims to become a catalyst for graphic design and printmaking in the community through project-based work, publishing, workshops, lectures, and fellowships.

Counterform is the space that exists in between and within letterforms. Forms do not exist without a space that surrounds them. In our organization, counterform is a metaphor of the way we want our work to respond to the needs of communities through research, design, and art strategies.

Our goal is to be a space for exposure, work, and critique; guiding talented high school students to build a portfolio that will get them into art school, offering opportunities for adults to develop their skills and talents, while providing a shared space that fosters engagement between community, business, and academia. Counterform is a multidisciplinary effort initiated by master printer Jacques Bidon, graphic designer Tatiana Gómez Gaggero, community advocate Delia Rodríguez-Masjoan, and graphic designer José Menéndez, and supported by the EcoArts USA team art director Pablo Rodriguez-Masjoan, creative strategist Don King, and Black History Scholar Marco McWIlliams. We have been working with clients on research, design and engagement for the past six months, and are planning a grand opening of the new print studio in the beginning of October, during Hispanic Heritage Month.

RIEAP: The RIEAP promotes professional development through workshops, conferences, and convenings. Which workshops, conferences, and convenings did you attend, find particularly useful, and why? 

Delia:  Our EcoArts USA team participated in many professional development workshops, conferences, and convenings. We found these to be very informative but more than anything an opportunity to meet new people, learn more things, and connect with like-minded folx through art and culture.

For more information about EcoArts USA visit www.ecoartsusa.org