Speaking &

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Colonization has not ended. We are not in a post-colonial age in a similar way that we are not in a post-racial age. Colonization has simply become normalized, perpetuated by dominant culture narratives, and accepted by the majority as part of life.

At the heart of storytelling lies power—the power to shape realities, to construct identities, and to influence the way we understand the world around us. Yet, for far too long, dominant narratives have silenced strategically marginalized peoples, privileging colonial perspectives and fossilizing histories in ways that erase complexity and diversity. Through Decolonizing Storytelling & Artistic Expression, Julián Esteban Torres López invites us to break free from these constraints, to question who tells the stories, whose stories are centered, and how these narratives perpetuate systems of oppression.

Drawing from a rich tapestry of cultural knowledge, creative expression, and critical theory, Julián’s approach to decolonizing storytelling is a call to reclaim storytelling as an act of liberation. His keynotes, workshops, conversations, and courses explore the intersections of history, art, and identity, offering participants transformative tools to not only recognize colonial legacies in their own work but also to actively dismantle them. With a commitment to amplifying marginalized concerns and experiences, fostering inclusive storytelling practices, unlocking imagination, and liberating creative expression, these offerings challenge us to evolve beyond fossilized pasts and towards narratives that honor the multiplicity of human experience.

Through these talks and sessions, Julián empowers communities, educators, changemakers, and artists to engage with storytelling and art creation as a dynamic and revolutionary practice—one that is rooted in compassion, collaboration, and a vision for a more just, equitable, and creative future.

The shadows and specters of colonialism and imperialism do not go away on their own. They haunt us until we conduct an exorcism. Join me in unlocking imagination's potential to shape a world founded on the liberating power of creativity and the creative power of liberation.

Keynotes • Workshops • Courses

Topics for Julián’s Offerings on Decolonizing Storytelling and Artistic Expression

(FYI: All keynotes are also offered as workshops and courses)

Reclaiming the Stories Within: Transforming Creative Writing for Liberation
Creative writing has long been shaped by colonial structures that influence what we write, how we write, and who gets to define “good writing.” But what happens when we challenge these conventions and reimagine creative expression? Decolonizing Creative Writing invites you to embark on a transformative journey to unlearn colonial standards, reclaim storytelling traditions, and create art that resists conformity while fostering cultural resurgence.
Through this keynote, Julián Esteban Torres López offers a profound exploration of how creative writing can become a tool for liberation, cultural survival, and collective healing.
What You’ll Discover
1. Writing Beyond Colonial Erasure
- Learn how colonial standards have shaped storytelling through language, narrative structures, and publishing practices.
- Explore strategies to reclaim personal and communal narratives from systems of oppression.
2. Reimagining Form and Aesthetics
- Challenge Western norms like “show, don’t tell” and linear plot structures to explore alternative storytelling techniques.
- Discover the power of circular narratives, collective voice, and multilingual expression.
3. Centering Systemically Marginalized Experiences
- Move beyond token representation to honor sophisticated storytelling traditions from systemically oppressed communities.
- Examine how to create spaces where marginalized voices can thrive authentically.
4. Questioning Power in Creative Writing
- Investigate the hidden power dynamics in workshops, publishing, and literary evaluation.
- Understand how “neutral” writing rules reinforce colonial hierarchies and what it means to write for liberation.
5. Stories as Tools for Resistance and Survival
- Examine how storytelling serves as a form of cultural continuity, advocacy, and empowerment.
- Learn to create work that centers relationships, cultural protocols, and community well-being over market demands.
Key Takeaways for Your Audience
- Liberated Creativity: Gain tools to break free from restrictive writing norms and reclaim narrative power.
- Cultural Empowerment: Understand how storytelling connects to sovereignty, identity, and self-determination.
- Inclusive Practices: Learn to create art that amplifies marginalized voices while fostering respect and reciprocity.
Why Hire Me for This Keynote?
As a cultural architect, public scholar, and writer with lived experience navigating and resisting colonial frameworks, I offer audiences the knowledge and tools to transform their creative practices. Your audience will leave inspired to:
- Unlearn inherited writing norms and adopt decolonial approaches to storytelling.
- Reflect on their roles as creators and gatekeepers in shaping equitable literary landscapes.
- Embrace new ways of thinking about form, purpose, and the power of storytelling.
Add-Ons to Enhance the Experience
- Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López
  Delve deeper into the themes of decolonizing creative writing through a thought-provoking one-on-one interview.
- Interactive Q&A Session
  Participate in a dynamic discussion where attendees can share their challenges, ask questions, and receive actionable advice.
Who Is This Keynote For?
- Writers & Storytellers: Explore alternative narrative frameworks and reclaim your voice.
- Educators & Academics: Transform teaching practices to reflect decolonial values.
- Publishers & Editors: Develop equitable approaches to evaluating and sharing diverse work.
- Community Leaders & Activists: Use storytelling as a tool for advocacy, empowerment, and cultural survival.
Why Now?
In a world reckoning with colonial legacies, storytelling is a vital tool for transformation. By decolonizing creative writing, we not only reclaim the stories within but also reimagine how art can shape equitable futures.
Book This Keynote Today
Are you ready to revolutionize your creative writing practice and inspire your audience to embrace storytelling as a tool for liberation? Contact me now to book Decolonizing Creative Writing. Together, we’ll transform narratives and ignite creative empowerment.
Uncover Your Distinctive Creative Voice Through Symbolic Exploration
In the expansive world of creative writing, the journey to discovering—or constituting—your distinctive voice and style is often marked by bold experimentation and fearless exploration. Writers face the exhilarating yet daunting task of navigating vast landscapes of symbols, language, and narrative structures to uncover their creative truths.
My keynote, Boldly Experiment with Symbols to Uncover/Constitute Your Distinctive Authorial Voices, serves as a guiding light for those embarking on this journey. By embracing symbolic experimentation, I encourage writers to explore their imagination, cultural identity, and lived experiences, empowering them to craft narratives that are deeply personal and universally resonant.
Key Concepts and Themes
1. Exploration of Symbols
- Give Voice to Your Interiority: Embrace abstract, nonlinear aspects of your subjective experience by mining your idiosyncrasies for symbolic depth.
- Celebrate the “Nonsensical”: Harness irrationality and dream logic to unlock untamed imagination and unconventional symbols.
- Build Personal Mythologies: Create original myth-systems that reflect your worldview and cultural identity.
2. Embracing Cultural Identity
- Breaking Symbol Traditions: Challenge traditional hierarchies and subvert established symbolic conventions.
- Hybridizing Symbolic Forms: Combine symbols from various influences to foster a pluralistic and inclusive creative practice.
- Embodying the Symbolic: Ground abstract ideas in visceral metaphors to enhance cultural and personal narratives.
3. Pushing Boundaries of Language and Narrative
- Meta-Symbolic Experimentation: Experiment with the materiality of text and images for symbolic communication.
- Challenge Conventional Narratives: Explore nonlinear storytelling and fragmented structures to reflect the complexity of life.
- Play with Language and Sound: Discover unique rhythms, cadences, and resonances that elevate your voice.
4. Cultivating Authenticity and Vulnerability
- Personal Expression: Trust your instincts and infuse your work with honesty and emotional resonance.
- Continual Growth: Embrace revision and refinement as vital parts of the creative journey.
Key Insights and Takeaways
This keynote provides:
- Fearless Exploration: Practical guidance to approach storytelling with openness and curiosity.
- Cultural Richness: Techniques to mine and celebrate cultural identity in your narratives.
- Linguistic Innovation: Tools to challenge conventions and experiment with language and structure.
- Symbolic Depth: Ways to imbue your work with layered meanings drawn from personal experiences.
- Authenticity: The confidence to embrace vulnerability and tell stories only you can create.
Who Is This Keynote For?
- Writers & Authors: Add depth and meaning to your work through symbolic exploration.
- Artists & Designers: Enhance visual storytelling with culturally resonant symbols.
- Educators & Academics: Inspire creativity in students by encouraging symbolic experimentation.
- Activists & Social Innovators: Use symbols to amplify marginalized voices and drive change.
- Creative Leaders & Entrepreneurs: Break free from convention to foster innovative thinking.
Add-Ons to Enhance Your Experience
- Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López
  Deepen your audience’s understanding with a one-on-one interview where we explore the keynote’s core concepts and my creative journey. Perfect for organizations seeking deeper engagement.
- Interactive Q&A
  Foster an open dialogue through a dynamic Q&A session, where attendees can ask questions, share their challenges, and receive tailored advice for applying symbolic exploration in their work.
Why Now?
In an era defined by complexity, diversity, and interconnectedness, storytelling demands new approaches that honor the multifaceted nature of our experiences. By exploring symbols, you can reshape how you create and connect, transforming narratives into powerful tools for innovation, authenticity, and social impact.
Book the Keynote Today
Are you ready to discover the transformative power of symbolic exploration? Let’s inspire your audience to embark on a creative journey of bold experimentation, cultural celebration, and self-expression.
Contact me to book the Boldly Experiment with Symbols keynote. Together, we’ll unlock the creative potential within your community and elevate your event.
Unlocking the Full Potential of Narrative
Storytelling has long been tethered to the dominance of visual-centric norms, shaping what we consider engaging, marketable, and valid. But what lies beyond sight? This keynote invites you to step into the boundless possibilities of multisensory storytelling, where narrative becomes a dynamic, inclusive, and transformative experience.
Delivered by Julián Esteban Torres López, Beyond Sight: Navigating the Depths of Storytelling explores how breaking free from visual constraints can enrich narratives, amplify marginalized voices, and push the boundaries of creative expression.
What You’ll Discover
1. Rethinking Storytelling Paradigms
Challenge the visual-centric conventions that limit creativity and representation. Learn how storytelling can transcend sight to embrace the full spectrum of human experience, opening doors to untapped narrative depth.
2. The Power of Multisensory Storytelling
Explore how engaging all the senses—sound, touch, taste, and smell—can create more immersive and resonant narratives that captivate audiences on profound emotional and intellectual levels.
3. Decolonizing Narrative Structures
Interrogate dominant storytelling frameworks, dismantle colonial perspectives, and create space for stories that honor diverse cultural traditions and amplify historically marginalized voices.
4. Expanding the Creative Toolkit
Uncover the power of literary devices—metaphors, symbolism, allegory, and allusion—to convey complexity and foster deeper connections with audiences.
5. Inclusive Character Development
Learn how to craft authentic, multidimensional characters that reflect the richness of human identity and challenge the narrow stereotypes perpetuated by visual-centric storytelling.
6. Exploring Cultural and Emotional Landscapes
Delve into the interconnectedness of culture and emotion in storytelling, using these landscapes to create narratives that inspire empathy and connection.
7. Embracing Interactivity
Discover how to transform audiences into active participants in the storytelling process, fostering collaboration, dialogue, and lasting impact.
Key Takeaways for Your Audience
- Creativity Unbound: Tools and strategies to break free from visual storytelling constraints.
- Empathy and Inclusion: Insights into amplifying diverse voices and creating culturally sensitive narratives.
- Sensory Mastery: Techniques to craft multisensory stories that resonate deeply.
- Practical Application: Actionable methods to refine narratives and inspire innovative storytelling practices.
Why Hire Me for This Keynote?
I bring a multidisciplinary perspective that bridges art, culture, and scholarship, offering audiences a transformative experience that challenges conventions and fosters creative growth. Your audience will leave inspired to:
- Rethink their narrative practices with an inclusive, multisensory approach.
- Embrace bold, innovative storytelling techniques.
- Foster cultural sensitivity and authenticity in their work.
Add-Ons to Enhance the Experience
- Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López
  Dive deeper into the keynote themes with an interactive interview exploring Julián’s storytelling philosophy and techniques.
- Interactive Q&A Session
  Engage directly with Julián in a dynamic discussion where attendees can ask questions, share challenges, and gain tailored insights for their storytelling practices.
Who Is This Keynote For?
- Writers & Authors: Unlock new dimensions of narrative creativity and emotional depth.
- Educators & Academics: Transform how storytelling is taught, encouraging diverse perspectives.
- Artists & Multimedia Creators: Explore multisensory techniques to enhance their craft.
- Activists & Social Innovators: Use storytelling to amplify marginalized voices and drive social change.
- Creative Leaders: Inspire innovation within teams and organizations by challenging traditional norms.
Why Now?
In an increasingly complex and interconnected world, traditional storytelling norms can feel restrictive and outdated. By moving Beyond Sight, you can foster stories that resonate with authenticity and cultural depth, creating meaningful connections in a time when they’re needed most.
Book This Keynote Today
Are you ready to revolutionize how you and your audience think about storytelling? Let’s work together to inspire, empower, and explore the boundless potential of narrative.
Contact me now to book Beyond Sight: Navigating the Depths of Storytelling. Together, we’ll chart a new course for creative expression.
Breaking Free from Genre Constraints
Art is boundless—an evolving, organic expression of creativity, culture, and imagination. Yet, genres attempt to define and constrain this boundlessness, acting as both guides and gatekeepers. In The Cost of Classification: Examining Genre Imposition in Art, Julián Esteban Torres López dives into the profound implications of genre on artistic expression, creativity, and cultural landscapes.
This keynote invites audiences to critically examine how genres, while offering utility, often impose restrictive boundaries that stifle innovation, reinforce power dynamics, and limit diversity in artistic practices.
What You’ll Discover
1. The Dual Role of Genres
- Understand the functional purpose of genres in organizing and marketing art.
- Explore how genres offer audiences a framework for appreciating art while simultaneously shaping their expectations.
2. The Limitations of Genre Boundaries
- Examine how genre imposition can act as a creative constraint, restricting artistic freedom and experimentation.
- Discover examples of groundbreaking artists and movements that transcended genre norms to reshape cultural landscapes.
3. The Societal Implications of Genre Imposition
- Investigate how genre enforcement reflects and perpetuates societal power dynamics.
- Learn about the cultural hierarchies embedded within genre classifications and how they marginalize diverse artistic voices.
4. Questioning Genre as Propaganda
- Reflect on the motivations behind genre propagation in the cultural industry.
- Explore how genre expectations can serve as a form of indoctrination, shaping not just art but thought itself.
5. A Call for Resistance
- Embrace strategies for challenging restrictive paradigms in art.
- Foster critical awareness of genre’s impact, empowering artists and audiences to resist creative conformity and embrace artistic diversity.
Key Takeaways for Your Audience
- Reclaiming Creative Freedom: Tools to navigate beyond genre boundaries and foster unrestricted innovation.
- Cultural Empowerment: Insights into amplifying diverse voices by challenging genre constraints.
- Critical Reflection: A deeper understanding of genre’s societal implications and how to resist its stifling effects.
Why Hire Me for This Keynote?
With a background as a cultural architect, public scholar, and multidisciplinary artist, I offer unique perspectives that bridge academic inquiry, cultural critique, and artistic practice. This keynote will inspire your audience to:
- Recognize the unseen costs of genre classification.
- Reimagine their approach to creating and engaging with art.
- Advocate for inclusive, genre-defying expressions of creativity.
Add-Ons to Enhance the Experience
- Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López
  Gain deeper insights into the keynote themes through an interactive interview exploring Julián’s critical perspective on genres and creativity.
- Interactive Q&A Session
  Engage directly with Julián to ask questions, share challenges, and gain actionable advice for fostering genre-defying art practices.
Who Is This Keynote For?
- Artists & Creators: Unlock the courage to transcend genre conventions and pursue unbounded creativity.
- Educators & Academics: Transform how artistic concepts and genres are taught, encouraging critical inquiry and innovation.
- Cultural Critics & Curators: Reexamine how art is classified, exhibited, and discussed in cultural spaces.
- Activists & Social Entrepreneurs: Explore how art beyond genre can challenge societal norms and drive change.
Why Now?
In a world increasingly driven by categorization and labels, genre imposition limits the infinite possibilities of human creativity. Now is the time to question these constraints, reimagine artistic paradigms, and foster a culture where creativity thrives beyond the boundaries of classification.
Book This Keynote Today
Are you ready to empower your audience to see art—and the world—through an uncategorized lens? Let’s inspire them to challenge genre norms and embrace artistic liberation.
Contact me now to book The Cost of Classification: Examining Genre Imposition in Art. Together, we’ll redefine the creative possibilities of your community.
Unlock Your Creative Potential and Redefine Freedom
Introduction
- Welcome! I'm Julián Esteban Torres López, and I invite you to explore the transformative power of the creativity and liberation cycle. This keynote guides you through the core concepts of my forthcoming book, offering insights into how we can break free from limitations imposed by Western colonialism and the Western gaze, and forge our own paths to personal and societal liberation.
Key Themes
- The Interplay of Creativity and Liberation: Discover how creativity acts as a vehicle for liberation, challenging norms and unlocking possibilities, while liberation provides the fertile ground for creative expression to flourish. Understand the reciprocal relationship where each element fuels the other.
- Transformative and Interconnected Nature: Explore the idea that each creative act has the potential to transform both the creator and the surrounding environment, fostering a continuous loop of personal and societal growth.
- Unleashing Creativity for Personal Liberation: Learn how creative expression empowers self-discovery, breaks through limiting beliefs, and fosters a sense of agency, enabling you to navigate the complexities of your inner world and societal expectations.
- Unleashing Creativity for Societal Liberation: See how creativity serves as a catalyst for societal change, challenging existing narratives, amplifying marginalized voices, and fostering a shift towards inclusivity.
- Understanding Limitations Imposed by Western Colonialism:
  - Colonial Legacies in Creative Expression: Examine how Western colonialism has shaped artistic expression and identify the limitations and distortions imposed by colonial narratives.
  - Eurocentrism and its Constraints on Creativity: Analyze the influence of Eurocentric norms on creative practices and how these norms limit diverse forms of creative expression.
  - Language, Identity, and Creative Boundaries: Investigate how language imposition restricts creative diversity and its impact on cultural identity.
- Decolonizing Creativity for Liberation:
  - Challenging the Western Gaze: Understand how the Western gaze limits creative perspectives and how we can challenge and dismantle it.
  - Reclaiming Narratives: Learn about the importance of reclaiming narratives and fostering counter-narratives that challenge Western-centric perspectives.
  - Centering Marginalized Voices: Explore strategies for centering the voices of marginalized communities and disrupting traditional power dynamics.
  - Collaborative and Intersectional Approaches: Discover the power of collaborative and intersectional approaches that bring together artists, scholars, and activists from diverse backgrounds.
  - Empowering Artists as Agents of Change: Recognize the role of artists in challenging the Western gaze and decolonizing creative practices.
  - Amplifying Marginalized Voices: Learn about how artistic expressions can challenge stereotypes, embrace cultural synthesis, and use language as a tool of liberation.
  - Creative Expression as Resistance: See how art becomes a powerful tool to reclaim agency, assert humanity, and resist oppression.
  - Artistic Activism and Social Change: Discover how art serves as a catalyst for social change and liberation.
  - Community Empowerment through Creativity: Explore initiatives where creative expression empowers marginalized communities.
  - Art as Cultural Preservation: Highlight the crucial role of creative expression in preserving and revitalizing marginalized cultures.
  - Language Revival and Creative Empowerment: Celebrate efforts to revive and preserve indigenous languages, and how this contributes to creative empowerment and liberation.
- Rethinking Liberty Beyond Western Paradigms:
  - Beyond Western Definitions of Liberty: Critically examine Western paradigms of liberty and explore alternative definitions rooted in diverse cultural perspectives.
  - Cultural Sovereignty and Self-Determined Liberation: Advocate for cultural sovereignty as a pathway to self-determined liberation.
- The Decolonized Creative Future: Envision a future where the creativity and liberation cycle frees individuals and societies from Western constraints.
What You'll Gain
- A deeper understanding of the relationship between creativity and liberation.
- Insights into the limitations imposed by Western colonialism and the Western gaze.
- Practical strategies for decolonizing your creative practices.
- Inspiration to challenge societal norms and redefine freedom.
- A vision for a liberated future shaped by the boundless potential of human creativity.
Enhance the Experience:
Alongside the keynote, you can offer your audience a chance to further engage with the themes and insights presented. Add more value to your event with these enriching opportunities:
1. Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López: Take a deeper dive into the themes and ideas of the keynote. An organization representative can interview Julián, unpacking key concepts and providing additional context. This personal conversation will give your audience an opportunity to ask questions, learn more about his work, and explore how the concepts of "The Creativity-Liberation Cycle" can apply to their unique creative endeavors.
2. Q&A Session with the Audience: After the keynote, Julián will engage with your audience through an interactive Q&A. Attendees will have the chance to ask questions, share their thoughts, and discuss how they can integrate multisensory storytelling into their own projects. This dynamic exchange helps foster a deeper understanding of the material while allowing for tailored insights specific to your group.
Call to Action
- Join me on this journey to unleash your creative potential and redefine freedom. This keynote will empower you to become an active participant in shaping a more equitable, inclusive, and liberated world.
- Contact me to learn more and book this keynote.
Unlock the Full Potential of Storytelling
In a world that often categorizes and compartmentalizes ideas, "Genreless Storytelling" challenges the status quo and invites audiences to rethink the very nature of narrative. This keynote, delivered by Julián Esteban Torres López, offers an exciting and transformative exploration of how we can break free from traditional genre constraints to create innovative, inclusive, and boundary-defying storytelling.
Drawing from his expertise as a polymath, artist, and cultural architect, Torres López reveals the profound potential of genreless storytelling to reshape the landscape of creative expression. This keynote is ideal for creators, educators, marketers, activists, and anyone looking to challenge conventional thinking and embrace storytelling that is fluid, experimental, and boundless.
What You’ll Experience:
- The Evolution of Storytelling: Understand how traditional genres have shaped the way we tell stories—and why it’s time to move beyond them.
- The Liberating Power of Genrelessness: Discover how embracing genreless storytelling can foster innovation, amplify marginalized voices, and break through artistic boundaries.
- Real-Life Examples: Explore concrete examples of genreless storytelling across literature, film, music, and other creative forms, showing how this approach is being applied today.
- Practical Insights: Gain valuable insights into how you can incorporate genreless storytelling into your own work, creating narratives that reflect the complexity of our world.
This keynote is not just about storytelling in the traditional sense; it’s a call to action to embrace creative freedom and explore new ways of engaging with our audiences. It's about breaking the mold, embracing complexity, and telling stories that resonate on a deeper, more authentic level.
Why Hire Me for Your Event?
I offer a transformative experience for your audience—whether they are writers, artists, marketers, or leaders. By attending the "Genreless Storytelling" keynote, your audience will:
- Be inspired to embrace their creativity without limitations.
- Understand the significance of genreless storytelling as a vehicle for inclusivity and social change.
- Walk away with actionable tools to incorporate genrelessness into their own work.
Through this keynote, we explore the importance of storytelling in shaping culture and advancing social change, offering new ways to think about creativity and narrative in a world that’s increasingly defined by interconnectedness and complexity.
Add-Ons to Enhance Your Experience:
Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López
Deepen your understanding of genreless storytelling through a one-on-one interview with me, where we’ll dive into the core ideas of the keynote. This intimate conversation will provide further insight into the principles of genrelessness and how they have shaped my own creative journey. Perfect for organizations looking to foster a deeper connection with the content of the keynote.
Q&A Session
Following the keynote, I engage with your audience through a dynamic Q&A session. This is an opportunity for attendees to ask questions, share their thoughts, and explore specific challenges related to genreless storytelling. The conversation will spark ideas and provide tailored advice to those seeking to apply genrelessness in their own creative practices. The Q&A is an essential component of the keynote experience, encouraging dialogue and deeper engagement with the ideas presented.
Who Is This Keynote For?
- Writers & Authors: Learn how to break free from traditional genre structures and create work that defies categorization.
- Filmmakers & Visual Artists: Explore how the concept of genrelessness can enhance storytelling through visual and multimedia forms.
- Educators & Academics: Gain insights into the importance of genreless storytelling in fostering critical thinking and creativity in students.
- Activists & Social Entrepreneurs: Understand how genreless storytelling can amplify marginalized voices and encourage social change.
- Creative Leaders & Entrepreneurs: Discover how adopting genrelessness can lead to innovative approaches in business, marketing, and leadership.
Why Now?
The world is increasingly defined by complexity, diversity, and interconnectedness. As we navigate this rapidly evolving landscape, traditional storytelling genres can feel limiting. This keynote is a timely exploration of how we can redefine storytelling to reflect the multifaceted realities of the modern world. Whether you're looking to disrupt the creative industries or inspire your team to think differently, "Genreless Storytelling" offers a unique opportunity to transform the way you approach narrative and creativity.
Book the Genreless Storytelling Keynote Today
Are you ready to break free from creative boundaries? Let’s redefine storytelling together.
Contact me now to book the Genreless Storytelling keynote and take the first step toward embracing your full creative potential. We can also discuss additional add-ons like interviews or Q&A sessions to enhance the experience for your audience

Let’s make your event an unforgettable exploration of creative freedom!
A Continued Evolution Rather than a Fossilized Past: Decolonizing Storytelling
A keynote on reclaiming narrative sovereignty and transforming the storytelling landscape
In this deeply personal and systemic exploration of decolonial storytelling, I share my journey as a bilingual, Colombia-born storyteller with Afro-Euro-Indigenous roots, examining how colonial structures continue to shape our narratives and the urgent need to transform them. Through eight interconnected sections, I weave together personal experience, critical analysis, and actionable pathways toward liberation in storytelling.
Beginning with my own reckoning with colonial identity, I move through the metaphorical language of wind and fireflies to illuminate the experiences of those displaced by colonial violence. The journey continues through an examination of how colonial paradigms have attempted to eradicate Indigenous cultures and storytelling traditions, while exploring the publishing industry's role in perpetuating these systems. Drawing on Indigenous wisdom about alternative forms of storytelling and confronting my own position as a gatekeeper, I ultimately share how The Nasiona emerged as a response to these challenges, creating space for marginalized voices to reclaim their narratives on their own terms.
This keynote is an invitation to join in the work of decolonizing storytelling—not just as an academic exercise, but as a vital practice of cultural preservation, healing, and transformation. Through personal stories, critical analysis, and practical solutions, we explore how to move beyond colonial limitations to create new possibilities for authentic, liberatory storytelling.
Enhance the Experience:
Alongside the keynote, you can offer your audience a chance to further engage with the themes and insights presented. Add more value to your event with these enriching opportunities:
1. Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López: Take a deeper dive into the themes and ideas of the keynote. An organization representative can interview Julián, unpacking key concepts and providing additional context. This personal conversation will give your audience an opportunity to ask questions, learn more about his work, and explore how the concepts of "Decolonizing Storytelling" can apply to their unique creative endeavors.
2. Q&A Session with the Audience: After the keynote, Julián will engage with your audience through an interactive Q&A. Attendees will have the chance to ask questions, share their thoughts, and discuss how they can integrate the key takeaways into their own projects. This dynamic exchange helps foster a deeper understanding of the material while allowing for tailored insights specific to your group.
Call to Action
- Join me on this journey to unleash your creative potential and redefine freedom. This keynote will empower you to become an active participant in shaping a more equitable, inclusive, and liberated world.
- Contact me to learn more and book this keynote.
To the Border Crossers: It’s Time to Start Biting Their Tongues Instead of Ours
A keynote on amplifying marginalized narratives and transforming cultural perceptions
In this reflective exploration of storytelling as a tool for social justice, I share my journey as a Colombian-born artist and activist, deeply influenced by my Latine heritage. This keynote addresses the persistent stereotypes and systemic barriers faced by marginalized communities while emphasizing the power of authentic narratives to drive change. Through five interconnected sections, I weave together personal experiences, critical insights, and actionable pathways toward empowerment in storytelling.
Beginning with my own encounters with identity and representation, I navigate the complexities of being Othered in a society that often dehumanizes those who do not conform to dominant narratives. I draw parallels between my experiences and the broader struggles of Latine individuals who confront unjust portrayals in media and culture. The discussion evolves into the foundational principles of The Nasiona, a storytelling organization dedicated to humanizing the experiences of the systematically marginalized, allowing their voices to resonate authentically.
This keynote is an invitation to engage in the vital work of reshaping narratives—not merely as an intellectual endeavor, but as an essential act of cultural reclamation and social justice. Through storytelling, we can challenge the status quo, dismantle stereotypes, and cultivate empathy. Together, we will explore how embracing our unique identities and amplifying diverse voices can lead to transformative cultural change, fostering a world where every individual is seen, heard, and valued as fully human.
Enhance the Experience:
Alongside the keynote, you can offer your audience a chance to further engage with the themes and insights presented. Add more value to your event with these enriching opportunities:
1. Interview with Julián Esteban Torres López: Take a deeper dive into the themes and ideas of the keynote. An organization representative can interview Julián, unpacking key concepts and providing additional context. This personal conversation will give your audience an opportunity to ask questions, learn more about his work, and explore how the concepts of "Unleash Your Narrative" can apply to their unique creative endeavors.
2. Q&A Session with the Audience: After the keynote, Julián will engage with your audience through an interactive Q&A. Attendees will have the chance to ask questions, share their thoughts, and discuss how they can integrate the key takeaways into their own projects. This dynamic exchange helps foster a deeper understanding of the material while allowing for tailored insights specific to your group.
Call to Action
- Join me on this journey to unleash your creative potential and redefine freedom. This keynote will empower you to become an active participant in shaping a more equitable, inclusive, and liberated world.
- Contact me to learn more and book this keynote.

Examples / Excerpts

of Keynotes

& Public Talks

Decolonizing Storytelling: From Survival to Liberation

a.k.a., A Continued Evolution Rather than a Fossilized Past: Decolonizing Storytelling

A keynote on reclaiming narrative sovereignty and transforming the storytelling landscape

In this deeply personal and systemic exploration of decolonial storytelling, I share my journey as a bilingual, Colombia-born storyteller with Afro-Euro-Indigenous roots, examining how colonial structures continue to shape our narratives and the urgent need to transform them. Through eight interconnected sections, I weave together personal experience, critical analysis, and actionable pathways toward liberation in storytelling.

Beginning with my own reckoning with colonial identity, I move through the metaphorical language of wind and fireflies to illuminate the experiences of those displaced by colonial violence. The journey continues through an examination of how colonial paradigms have attempted to eradicate Indigenous cultures and storytelling traditions, while exploring the publishing industry's role in perpetuating these systems. Drawing on Indigenous wisdom about alternative forms of storytelling and confronting my own position as a gatekeeper, I ultimately share how The Nasiona emerged as a response to these challenges, creating space for marginalized voices to reclaim their narratives on their own terms.

This keynote is an invitation to join in the work of decolonizing storytelling—not just as an academic exercise, but as a vital practice of cultural preservation, healing, and transformation. Through personal stories, critical analysis, and practical solutions, we explore how to move beyond colonial limitations to create new possibilities for authentic, liberatory storytelling.

Colonization has not ended. We are not in a post-colonial age in a similar way that we are not in a post-racial age. Colonization has simply become normalized, perpetuated by dominant culture narratives, and accepted by the majority as part of life.
Being a bilingual, Colombia-born storyteller with Afro-Euro-Indigenous (colonizer and colonized) roots, colonialism has been bred into my bones. It has also grown weeds onto my tongue and has been forced upon me as an identity of my nativity, even though I can trace my lineage on this land back thousands of years, long before quixotic Europeans (some of whom were also my ancestors) set foot on these shores. I call myself Colombia-born instead of Colombian because Colombia was named after Christopher Columbus. (Even this attempt to center my full self is still limiting.) The territory now known as Colombia is the only country in the world named after probably the most infamous colonizer. Colombian means follower of Columbus, and I am not a supporter of Columbus. Period.
When Spanish American revolutionaries took up arms 200 years ago and fought a decade’s worth of war to liberate themselves from imperial Spain, and after they secured their independence from the grip of Spanish royals, the revolutionaries decided to call the hard-won territory Colombia after the colonizer. It was not that these victorious rebels were against colonialism, per se. No. Instead, these revolutionaries were against Spanish colonialism, Iberian colonialism. The elite Spanish Americans wanted to control the land, people, minds, future, flora, fauna, and biota on the hips of this newly conquered continent. They wanted to remain in power without having to bow down to, or give a little back to, the crown. No, it was not that they were intrinsically against colonialism.
Further, the fact that we still call ourselves Colombians two centuries later and that we have not—with any earnestness or eagerness—dissected such a situation is troublesome and exasperating. I would love to start a movement to rename ourselves to reclaim ourselves so we can then reinhabit ourselves in a way that is more aligned to the reality of who we are, collectively, in a more inclusive way, instead of consistently having to elevate the colonial part of our history as the most valuable identity worth centering, thereby dehumanizing the Brown and Black aspects of ourselves, as a result. Our current group name is the ultimate monument to settler colonialism—a narrative statue that needs to be toppled for us to truly advance in the journey of liberation.
That said, settler colonialism should be understood as a structure, not an event. Simply renaming ourselves will not liberate us. Wars of liberation from colonial powers, or “peaceful” transitions into autonomous states and away from colonial forces, should not be how we measure the existence of colonialism. When we decolonize, we decolonize the whole self, not just an aspect of our oppressed identities. As bell hooks advanced, decolonization is a centering process that takes us from slavery to freedom, from void to wholeness. It’s a process of transformation that intentionally shifts away from institutions, systems, policies, and cultures of domination. It is a critical process of self-examination and communal introspection. We have to be constantly creating new language, telling new stories, acting off different scripts, and building new systems to allow us to be who we really are and want to become. Current colonial and binary languages, the whitewashing of history, the gatekeepers of culture, and the designers of our policies keep us bound to settler colonialism as they continue to essentialize us into something that is either limiting, distorted, or false for the sake of the power and comfort of the status quo. Sometimes that status quo is hundreds of years old, regardless if it considers itself a present-day colony.
I come from the Audre Lorde school of resistance in that I am dedicating both my life and my creative talent to confronting and addressing injustices because, as Lorde wrote: “Your silence does not protect you.” Lorde emphasized that “the transformation of silence into language and action is a self-revelation, and that always seems fraught with danger.” People are afraid of others’ reactions for speaking, but mostly for demanding visibility, which is essential to live. Lorde added, “We can sit in our corners mute forever while our sisters and ourselves are wasted, while our children are distorted and destroyed, while our earth is poisoned; we can sit in our safe corners mute as bottles, and we will still be no less afraid. […] People are taught to respect their fear of speaking more than silence, but ultimately, the silence will choke us anyway, so we might as well speak the truth.”
Even when we are afraid, we can learn to speak. I am done allowing others to choke me. I am done choking myself. I am done biting my tongue for the comfort of others, which directly burdens me with the consequences of oppression—mine and yours. I want to become more than just a survivor. I want to overcome my own complicity in my and your suffering, and I want you to overcome yours, as well. I want to reinvent and create beyond what we have accepted as the best of all possible worlds. I will start with my voice, and yours. As Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis wrote, “The narratives you give power through silence become our future.” Let us be silent no more.
For this conversation, I want to set a foundation that builds upon my autobiography, a diaspora story of migration from South America to both Canada and the United States. I want to start by interpreting one of my poems, entitled “The Wind,” to enforce my tone. The poem is about decolonizing and indigenizing ourselves. The poem centers two characters: the wind and the fireflies.
- The wind represents an Indigenous child torn away from his parents and community via the residential and boarding school initiatives, whose primary objective was to “civilize” or assimilate Indigenous children and youth into Euro-Canadian and Euro-United Statesian cultures. In short, these so-called “schools” were designed to “kill the Indian and save the man.”
- The fireflies in the poem are the descendants of enslaved Africans throughout the Americas, whose ancestors were kidnapped, taken hostage by white human traffickers, packed into ships like sardines and taken across the Atlantic Ocean, and forced to work in death camps by torturers and murderers after these said enslavers had already nearly wiped out most of their previous forced labor: the Indigenous communities from which the wind is a descendant.
In the piece, both the wind and the fireflies journey to find their cultural, social, and historical roots under environments that have whitewashed their past, erased them from history, invalidated their experiences, gaslighted them, vilified them, and attempted (at times succeeded at) genocide against them.
The wind searches for its mother as a form of Rematriation, validation, and healing. In this process, the wind stumbles upon the fireflies, who are also on their own personal and communal journeys. Yet, as they come to realize, even those with lit paths can feel lost at times. Even those of us who can trace our lineages to a specific region of the world can still feel invisible, adrift, misplaced, and cast away—exploited, marginalized, undervalued, overlooked, silenced, and forgotten by intentionally designed systems of oppression and dominant cultures that continue to be part of our society’s legacy. The poem, “The Wind,” follows the survivors of settler colonialism as they search for remnants of their cultures, of their heritages, of their peoples, of their identities, of their homes on Turtle Island and Africa.
Some people go through their day-to-day lives as if some of us have not experienced dystopia. They read their dystopian novels as warnings of what can happen in the future if we continue on, or take, a certain path. But, for example, Indigenous folks worldwide continue to experience that dystopia since settler colonialism. Their fears are and have been a reality for many of us; they just happen to benefit from our dystopia.
Imagine experiencing genocide, theft of your ancestral lands, your sacred rituals made illegal, forced to assimilate and detach yourself from your culture and your people. Imagine having your language and traditions outlawed and made punishable. Imagine being suppressed and being treated like a beast of burden or second class (if treated like humans at all) for generations and generations and generations and generations. Then, you’re made out to be the terrorist of the story—deserving of the brutalization and dehumanization—through the enacted and enforced policies and the whitewashing of history and the whitewashing of all forms of art, culture, and storytelling. This is dystopia.
When a person, a book, a film, a society, a culture, etc., labels the survivors of settler-colonial oppression as savages, while simultaneously identifying the oppressors as civilized, this should be a blatant indication of the whitewashing of history and our collective stories.
The criminalization and dehumanization of our existence, the whitewashing of history, and the erasure of a people and culture from it is a form of genocide.
This is a problem that requires your attention and mine, as whether we like it or not, whether we are conscious of it or not, our actions, habits, dispositions, rituals, practices, and beliefs are more likely than not perpetuating such a legacy, making us complicit, regardless of our intent.
The eradication of culture and imagination is an essential part of settler colonialism. I agree with Laguna Pueblo feminist Paula Gunn Allen when she stated that “the wars of imperial conquest have [also] been fought within the minds, bodies, and hearts of the people of the earth for dominion over them.” She said that “we must remember our origins, our cultures, our histories, our mothers and grandmothers, for without that memory, which implies continuance rather than nostalgia, we are doomed to engulfment by a paradigm that is fundamentally inimical to the vitality, autonomy, and self-empowerment essential for satisfying, high-quality life.”
Colonial paradigms, time and again, continue to try to have us believe that Indigenous peoples were not civilized or cultured until we came across European whiteness and Euro-centric ways of life, thinking, and doing; that we were not spiritual until we came upon Christianity; that we were not educated until we came upon English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, German, Russian, Latin, and Greek languages, philosophies, literature, music, and other forms of art. That the only way we can move up in this world and become successful and live quality lives is if we align ourselves to numerous forms of supremacy: white supremacy, male supremacy, Christianity supremacy, cis supremacy, hetero supremacy, able-bodied supremacy, and if we worship models of organization and development that treat and relate to our environment and other peoples as resources for exploitation rather than as extensions of ourselves and our families; that we cannot become successful and live quality lives unless we uncritically bow down to arbitrarily defined forms of art regarded as masterpieces that reflect the very same supremacies I just mentioned. European art is high art, they say, while Indigenous art is folk art, for example.
This is how settler colonialism continues to shape our reality and our storytelling. In other words, to civilize the so-called “savage” was to eradicate tribal attachments and to kill the Indigenous, save the body, and infuse it with Euro-centric values so the bodies would become docile vessels, relegated to inferior positions, to be more easily coerced into benefitting the greed and satisfying the whims of Europeans and those of European descent without much resistance. These vessels would become more docile if settler-colonists molded them into their images.
This civilizing machine of settler colonialism has ruptured our place in the world for over 500 years; yet, we’re still here… resisting.
The first stories we experience are not novels or films. The first stories we experience are rooted in relationships. They are rooted in what we tell ourselves about ourselves, others, and our surroundings, which are also informed by what others tell us about ourselves, others, and our surroundings. These stories shape how we engage with our words and our worlds. These stories help determine whether we alienate and estrange ourselves, or whether we connect with ourselves. These stories help determine, to a large extent, how we will behave and how we interpret external and internal stimuli. All of this starts before we read our first book, write our first poems, or sing along to our first song.
This means that it is extremely important for us to interrogate the gatekeepers of such stories… for us to unpack and dissect the frameworks of our society—those lenses that pass as common sense. We must shine a light on the roots of our cultural consciousness—its backdrop, social structures, agents, institutions, unspoken assumptions, and taken-for-granted ideologies.
For example, let’s interrogate representation in mainstream storytelling. Invisibility is part of our current situation as Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color... those of us from the global majority. And, if we are visible at all, the situation tends to lean toward misrepresentation—limited, distorted, or false caricatures of who we are, were, and could be. Misrepresentations that may positively impact the psyches and imaginations of those benefiting from such oppressive systems, and misrepresentations that also negatively impact the psyches and imaginations of those targeted and subjugated within such dominant settler-colonial cultures. All of which create soil that makes it so fear and hatred can more easily grow against those who have been Otherized and devalued, which also include other realms of oppressed diversity dimensions like ethnicity, nativity, sex, gender, orientation, disability, religion, education, and class.
Let’s also dissect how the publishing industry’s focus on profit perpetuates colonial paradigms. Something we experience in many storytelling industries—be it film, the stage, the page, or radio—is a focus on perpetuating the status quo. We can see this in ways editors, agents, and publishers, for example, pander to the bigotries of the dominant culture, and try to disassociate themselves from their complicity with such systems of oppression by justifying their actions on the ethically hollow response that they are just “giving the people what they want.” Well, what the people want is not us. So, if it’s more profitable to pander to bigots that uphold oppressive colonial frameworks—such as racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, etc.—then they will flex their muscles to hold up such architecture.
One thing we experience a lot from agents, editors, and publishers in the literary world is an insistence to change our stories, our characters, our names, and the topics we wish to discuss, in order to appease said bigotries because these literary agents, editors, and publishers do not want to make this target audience that drives the profits of their industry (as they perceive it, anyway) uncomfortable. So, what they ask of us is to, again, assimilate… to decenter and erase and dismember ourselves from our stories in order to make our stories more marketable to the very people who oppress us. Again, to kill the Native, but save the person so the body becomes a vessel for serving the interests of those benefiting from the status quo put in place and upheld by settler colonialism.
Further, there are genres they try to force us into, which limits our creativity if it cannot be marketed to such bigotries. Yet, those given the opportunity to experiment and explore and go beyond the boundaries of the status quo tend to be those who already benefit from it. These are just more forms of gatekeeping and forced or coerced assimilation.
Let’s take, for example, what is often taught as good writing: that stories should have a plot; a beginning, middle, and end, even if it’s not in that order. Earlier in the year, I spoke with India-based journalist Akanksha Singh about her essay "What if writing lost plot?" to continue to get her perspective. She said, “The idea of a ‘strong’ narrative arc (and plot) is something that is extremely culturally relative. So much so that it’s been erased in the very white and Western world of ‘good’ writing. Consider, for instance, how white writers—LeGuin and Woolf—can get away with plotless, arc-less stories and novels, where writers of color simply don’t. We’re familiar with these ‘avant garde’ forms, but largely when they come through the white/Western lens. It is, in my opinion, a very limited form,” she said. She even almost went as far as to say it (the limitation of stories having plots and narrative arcs) may be one of the reasons prose has not grown beyond the novel and short story.
And as I continue my journey to connect with my Indigenous heritage, I am constantly reminded of the different forms of storytelling throughout all of our Indigenous communities that do not align themselves solely to the plot/narrative arc forms of storytelling.
For example, according to Emily Aguilar, an arts educator and community leader working to ignite Indigenous sovereignty and gender and racial justice: “Euro-centric storytelling guidelines limit storyteller creativity. They also limit our understandings as recipients of stories. Some stories are shaped like an arc, but this isn’t the only way. Not all stories have a beginning, middle, and end. Not all stories have a main character. Some stories are shaped like water. Some stories flow. Some stories have multiple currents. Some stories are shaped like a tree. They have roots beneath the surface, visible and invisible elements, and we may see only part of the story. But we know it is vast and strong. It gives us so much to think about, long after the story is over. Some stories are shaped like wind. They ebb and flow. They have strong gusts and gentle breezes. You may not see a story, but all over your body you feel a story there. You see it moving others, too. Some stories are shaped like fire. They move quickly, they inspire strong feelings, they gather people around them. They may have teachings that show up quickly, or take time to see. Fire stories are sometimes short, making them the easiest to remember and pass on. Some stories are constellations. They connect us to other places and times. They leave us with more questions than answers. They reveal endless possibilities.”
Emily Aguilar continued to say that “there is no wrong way to shape a story. A story is a gift from Creator. Trying to change a story to fit Euro-centric models is disrespectful.” “Show gratitude,” she wrote, “by accepting the story as it comes to you, and allow learners to do the same.”
As a gatekeeper myself, both Singh and Aguilar, among many others, have gotten me to think about my inherent biases in writing and storytelling and curating, and where those biases came from. I needed to deconstruct and dissect my literary instincts even more. Gatekeepers are curators who end up creating stories as a result of their selection process, pretty similar to the power that historians and educators have.
For my process, after decades of doing this, I would catch myself trusting my instincts more and critically thinking about my selection process less. But I do go back to dissect the instinct to learn why I’m disposed in a specific manner, why I like certain arrangements, certain artistry, etc. But I need to dissect these instinctual, almost knee-jerk reactions, primarily because I, like everyone else, have ingrained biases and prejudices.
We are all born into dominant cultures, and, as a result, and to different degrees, are all products of this enculturation and socialization. So, when in social justice we discuss deconstructing, dismantling, rebuilding, unlearning, decolonizing, etc., our instincts also have to be dissected. Our instincts are exactly where we can identify our biases and prejudices. Our bodies, hearts, and minds tend to go to the trained and comfortable spaces of our being to help us survive and exist with minimal stress. Instincts, for me, are an extremely valuable source for decision making (like an athlete who trains themselves to produce one specific technical move thousands of times until they no longer have to think about it but can trust the mind and body to do it instinctively). Conversely, these knee-jerk reactions can also be the very specific identifiers of other ways we have also been trained to create other kinds of instincts, bigoted instincts, many times without us even knowing we were trained to react in a certain way.
This realization for me was both a benefit and a burden, and brought me lots of hesitation and many concerns as the leader of an organization like The Nasiona that is intentionally trying to challenge systems of oppression and dominant cultures. I say this because my team and I have all been trained in this settler colonial dominant culture to define “good” writing, for example, in a very specific way, which is ultimately a very Euro-centric colonial way of assigning value to what a “good story” is supposed to do, how it supposed to be arranged, whose comfort it is supposed to center, etc. Arranging anthologies and selecting essays for publication in our magazine, for example, are some of the areas where I have to constantly check myself and have others check me so we are aligned to The Nasiona’s mission more effectively.
As I stated earlier, I come from the Audre Lorde tradition in that my work with The Nasiona embodies the recognition that our silence will not protect us. Our silence will not protect us from a world designed to subjugate so many of us. If we remain quiet, and if you remain quiet, these ingrained instincts and biases and prejudices will steer our stories and how we curate them and how we assign them value.
One question I ask myself repeatedly as a storyteller and as a gatekeeper is: How can we reimagine and redesign and free ourselves from the shackles and limitations of colonial storytelling? The Nasiona was my response to that question.
The Nasiona is a movement that centers, elevates, and amplifies the personal stories of those Othered by systems of oppression and dominant cultures. Our work centers decolonization, liberation, empowerment, healing, and transformation. Through our magazine, podcast, publishing house, music series, mentorship program, fellowships, live events, along with other initiatives and partnerships (like this one), we strive to humanize the Other. We look to erase borders, tackle taboos, resist conventions, explore the known and unknown, and to rename ourselves to claim ourselves. We believe that the subjective can offer its own reality and reveal truths some so-called facts cannot discover. From liminal lives to the marginalized, and everything in between, we promote personal stories and conduct interviews that explore the spectrum of human experience through an intersectional lens.
Our initiatives and series, for example, have so far centered the following communities and topics: Being Latina/e/o/x; Being LGBTQIAA+; Diaspora and Immigration; Being Mixed Race; Womanhood and Trauma; BIPOC Musical Artists; Disability, Mental Health, and Chronic Conditions; Deconstructing Dominant Cultures; and Stories on Human Connection and Disconnection. We are consistently always working on something.
All of this is to say that “We confront in order to connect.” According to Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., this is also “the legacy of James Baldwin. The troubles we’re in are deeper than we thought because the troubles are in us, which requires us to be vulnerable. The autobiographical is the point of entry into the global context.”
By centering the autobiographical in everything we do at The Nasiona—and who we pass the mic to and advocate for—are some of the main ways we are actively working toward decolonizing and indigenizing storytelling: by centering, elevating, and amplifying the voices, histories, and experiences of those who have been exploited, marginalized, undervalued, overlooked, silenced, and forgotten by settler-colonial systems of oppression and dominant cultures.
We are intentionally changing the landscape by including the excluded, making visible those who’ve been erased and misrepresented, allowing them to speak their own truths, and we take those truths and amplify them by using different platforms and through different initiatives and partnerships so we can inundate the culture with these stories.
In doing so, we are normalizing a new normal in storytelling industries and spaces; and we are creating a space for healing, transformation, community, connection, and empowerment. I want to use my influence and power in the storytelling and social justice worlds to remove barriers and create new situations where survivors of settler colonialism can take off their masks and stop worrying about assimilating and code-switching to be accepted or to be treated with the respect they deserve. And in this liberating space, I want them to feel and be safe enough, encouraged enough, welcomed enough, and supported enough for them to be liberated to be their authentic selves without hurdles, fear, or shame. They, and we, will be better off for it, and so will our stories, thereby leaving a different storytelling legacy of which we can all be proud.
The longer I work with said communities, the more it becomes apparent that settler colonialism and imperialism have transformed many parts of the world, leaving a legacy of violence, trauma, and destruction. The “civilizing” machine of settler colonialism has ruptured the place of many of us in this world, which includes our relationships with ourselves, others, our environment, and our life activity, work, and creative pursuits.
We have to be very cognizant of the fact that colonialism and imperialism do not simply use force to dominate. As Edward Said in Culture and Imperialism understood, imperialism can continue to influence colonies and former colonial territories via how they employ culture to control distant lands and people, because storytelling and literature have “the power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming and emerging,” which might contradict or perpetuate the colonization of a people.
In the words of Yankon Dakota writer, editor, translator, musician, educator, and political activist Zitkála-Šá: “A wee child toddling in a wonder world, I prefer to their dogma my excursions into natural gardens where the voice of the Great Spirit is heard in the twittering of birds, the rippling of mighty waters, and the sweet breathing of flowers. If this is Paganism, then at present, at least, I am a Pagan.”
Zitkála-Šá had a vision for Indigenous peoples that I have adopted as a vision for all of the peoples The Nasiona serves: a continued evolution rather than a fossilized past. An evolving translation and community preservation.
So, with The Nasiona, we elevate ourselves and say, “Enough!” And in the process of disentangling ourselves from relationships of abuse, we reinvent ourselves to reclaim ourselves. We set boundaries that center our needs as a form of self-love. With these raw, real, and personal stories, we constitute a statue of personhood, our personhood―humanizing ourselves―blending our scars with our strengths and our vision for ourselves, rejecting the lies that had previously depicted us as lesser than.
With The Nasiona we rise and become a revolutionary scaffold that centers us. Our own healing and self-validation: a form of resistance. We take up space and take control of our stories and tell them in our own ways. We remind others that it is okay to love themselves and to lose themselves in their own embrace. And in that cradle, we deconstruct our form, rebuilding it into something that makes more sense to us.
In our defiance, we force ourselves to not only behold our stories but storytelling as a whole, creating the conditions for us to also dissect our literary instincts and other borders of abuse that have colonized our bodies, minds, and hearts.
Through my work and the work of The Nasiona, we hope to inspire our readers, listeners, and followers to also experiment with their own lives and communities in order to create beyond the limits of the forces that have for far too long told us to sit down, shut up, and follow the rules.
Our silences will not protect us. So, I speak, and I help others speak, and I will take the consequences as they come.
An organization representative interviews Torres López to go deeper into his work and the main ideas of the keynote.
Torres López converses with the audience by entertaining their questions.

Unleash Your Narrative: Empowerment Through Storytelling

a.k.a., To the Border Crossers: It’s Time to Start Biting Their Tongues Instead of Ours

A keynote on amplifying marginalized narratives and transforming cultural perceptions

In this reflective exploration of storytelling as a tool for social justice, I share my journey as a Colombian-born artist and activist, deeply influenced by my Latine heritage. This keynote addresses the persistent stereotypes and systemic barriers faced by marginalized communities while emphasizing the power of authentic narratives to drive change. Through five interconnected sections, I weave together personal experiences, critical insights, and actionable pathways toward empowerment in storytelling.

Beginning with my own encounters with identity and representation, I navigate the complexities of being Othered in a society that often dehumanizes those who do not conform to dominant narratives. I draw parallels between my experiences and the broader struggles of Latine individuals who confront unjust portrayals in media and culture. The discussion evolves into the foundational principles of The Nasiona, a storytelling organization dedicated to humanizing the experiences of the systematically marginalized, allowing their voices to resonate authentically.

This keynote is an invitation to engage in the vital work of reshaping narratives—not merely as an intellectual endeavor, but as an essential act of cultural reclamation and social justice. Through storytelling, we can challenge the status quo, dismantle stereotypes, and cultivate empathy. Together, we will explore how embracing our unique identities and amplifying diverse voices can lead to transformative cultural change, fostering a world where every individual is seen, heard, and valued as fully human.

Who here has played chess? Ajedrez? Now, who can tell me what is the most powerful piece on the chessboard? Now here’s a question: How did it come to be that a game played mostly by men for nearly two thousand years evolved to have a woman as its most powerful piece? The answer, I came to find out, was not that surprising at all.
According to Marilyn Yalom in her book Birth of the Chess Queen: A History, it appears the modern move of the queen began in what is now known as Spain during the reign of Isabella the First. Her power may have inspired the move, which combined the roles of the bishop and the rook. From here, the move quickly spread outside Spanish borders for two reasons:
First, the Gutenberg press had by this time reached the Iberian Peninsula, which facilitated the printing of new chess books.
Second, the 1492 Alhambra decree ordered the expulsions of approximately 200,000 Jews from Spain, who then carried the new version of chess with them as they departed. This, of course, was also the very same queen who sent Christopher Columbus that very same year to what is now known as the Americas and the Caribbean.
This Isabella-inspired chess became known as the “queen’s chess” to some and “madwoman’s chess” to others. Sadly, but not surprising, though, it appears there was an aggressive response to this new rule that gave so much power to a woman, more power than any other piece on the chessboard. The adverse reaction to this revolutionary change to the game ranged from anxiety to straight-up abuse against women. All over a game. Regarding and accepting a woman as powerful was a threat to the traditional patriarchy.
The first step toward accepting a woman as powerful is imagining her as powerful.
Chess, interestingly enough, may have done more for women’s rights than many of us normally consider because for hundreds of years it was one of the only places where not only did women have power, but men wanted to be them.
Out of the barbarity and evil that came out of Isabella’s Spanish Inquisition and genocide and enslavement of the indigenous populations of the Americas during Spanish conquest and the trans-Atlantic kidnapping and human trafficking it led to thereafter, this other specific border crossing—of the Queen’s role re-imagined on the chessboard—got me thinking about the power of symbols, the power of imagination, and the power of stories to transform culture. And, once culture is transformed, politics tend to follow.
Giving a voice to the undervalued and overlooked is a very personal thing for me. After immigrating to the US from Colombia as a child, it was very easy to have self-hatred and low expectations. More than half of TV shows and movies represented, and still represent, other Latinx individuals, like me, predominantly as criminals, and the rest as janitors, maids, gardeners, and machos trying to impregnate your daughters. Our intelligence has been judged on our competency of the English language. I cannot stress how important it is to have good role models and people to look up to and to recognize yourself in the stories society and the mainstream deem as good, valuable, and worthy of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
We must recognize the kind of damage such racist and xenophobic caricatures do not only to the Latinx community, to BIPOC, to immigrants, to women, foreigners, to all Others, but also to society as a whole. Talented people are overlooked, divisions are drawn, people (including ourselves) stop dreaming, we become scared of our neighbors, hatred sets in, enemy camps are created, and, as a result, instead of working together toward a better future, we (as a society) spend most of the time, instead, afraid, ashamed, resentful, disgusted, angered, and in fear of ghosts that don’t really exist. All negative and debilitating things.
As an immigrant Other, the only show I remember watching growing up in New Hampshire where I actually felt I could see myself in and gave me hope was Ghostwriter. Some of you may remember it. It was a children’s mystery television series on PBS that aired in the early- to mid-1990s set in Brooklyn. With the help of an invisible ghost, a group of close-knit friends solved neighborhood crimes. The group was diverse: Asian, Black, Latinx, etc. It was my favorite show. It gave me the confidence and boost I can only imagine non-racialized minorities, non-people of color—that is to say white folks—in the United States feel daily when they consume most mainstream media. I loved this show. Its last episode aired over 20 years ago, and I still think about it and the impact it had on my life.
There was even a character who was a war vet who was homeless, and he was a poet. He would make money composing poems for people who would walk by. In a way, this show gave me permission to become a poet, to become a writer … a thinker who could solve problems and the mysteries of my own world. I wanted to move to Brooklyn because of it.
One of the producers of the show many years later revealed during an interview that the ghost in the show—the actual ghostwriter—was a “runaway” enslaved person during the US Civil War. He had taught other enslaved folks how to read and write but was later killed by police and their dogs. His soul was kept in a book until one of the kids in the show opened the book, thereby freeing the enslaved. In an indirect way, this former enslaved Other, this “ghostwriter,” freed me to become who I could be in a way nothing else had at the time.
As I reflected on the show, I realized that one way to empower ourselves is by changing our perspectives and taking control of our narratives, telling our own stories through our voices and not through the lenses of groups who cannot speak for us or who used (and continue to use) us as a prop to either make money, entertain themselves, make themselves feel better about themselves, exploit us, or justify their own prejudices.
The dominant narratives tend to benefit those who have had traditional power and influence over society. Yet, sometimes all we need to change or disrupt power relations is not a new policy or the overhaul of an existing system (which, of course, are highly needed), but also realizing the power those traditionally labeled as powerless have. Identifying these blind spots is crucial, and one of the best places to start is by challenging commonplace and conventional assumptions about relationships, about power. Power in the sense of increasing our relative capacities to generate effective action in our worlds. Ghostwriter empowered me.
With The Nasiona, the social justice storytelling organization I founded and run, we share stories that explore the spectrum of human experience and give us a glimpse into different, foreign, and at times extraordinary worlds. In short, we humanize the Other. The stories I am most interested in amplifying are those of the systematically marginalized … the undervalued, the overlooked, the silenced, and the forgotten. The ghostwriters. I want The Nasiona to have the kind of impact Ghostwriter had on me. I want The Nasiona to have the kind of impact the queen on the chessboard had on the culture and how it allowed those who played the game to imagine, in many cases for the first time, a woman having power. I want it to have the kind of power an honest, vulnerable, courageous, and real conversation between friends who care about each other can have.
I read something the other day by civil rights activist and co-founder of the #BlackLivesMatter movement, Alicia Garza, that stuck with me. She said that “Every successful social movement in the country’s history has used disruption as a strategy to fight for social change. Whether it was the Boston Tea Party to the sit-ins at lunch counters throughout the South, no change has been won without disruptive action.”
This got me to thinking that if you, if we, the border crossers, the immigrants, the sons and daughters of those who have been Othered, who have been marginalized, of those of us labeled as undesirables from shithole countries, if us Latinx peoples want things to change in this country, in this time in history, it will most likely come through making people uncomfortable, especially when there are so many out there who don’t want things to change. As Martin Luther King, Jr., once stated, “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
Consider this event this afternoon our list of demands. Demands to be heard. Demands to be centered. Demands to be seen as fully human worthy of the same rights and privileges bestowed upon so many others who reside in the United States.
For many years, for many decades, for many centuries, we’ve been regarded as savages, as beasts of burden, as needing to be purified, civilized, sterilized, and more recently we have been deemed by the current president as criminals and rapists. All of these labels create stories, create narratives in the minds of people that then are turned into stereotypes and caricatures and expectations that we—individuals and communities from Latin America or descendants from Latin America—have to shoulder and navigate.
We come to the starting line without being given the benefit of the doubt, but, instead, are drowning in a sea of fear and hatred, and are, as a result, forced to prove ourselves to not be these negative stereotypes—these criminals or drug dealers—to simply be taken seriously and respected. We are working against institutions, structures, systems, politics, culture, and deeply ingrained prejudices against us that go back hundreds of years. What I am saying, I am sure, is nothing new to you.
If I were to take a roll call to see who here has experienced some form of racism or xenophobia just in the past week, I am sure a wave of hands would be extended in the air. And I am sure there are many of us who have bitten our tongues when we have instead wanted to say, “Fuck you” to, in my case, the English teacher who treated me like and called me an animal, or the football coach who called me a Spic.
“Fuck you” I wanted to say to all of those since my teenage years who have treated me like someone—some thing—lesser because of my brown skin or my surnames or because I was not born here; to those who decided to not sit next to me on the bus, to those who clutched their purses or crossed the street when I approached in the mall or on the sidewalk; to those who have been surprised that I am articulate when I opened my mouth to speak; to those who were surprised to learn I have held leadership positions; to those who treat me as a servant simply because they think that people who look like me are put on this world to serve people who look like them; to those people who have screamed “White Power!” in my face with fists in the air and anger in their eyes, threatening me to not enter a restaurant because people like me, people like us, “do not belong” here.
What I am saying, I am sure, is nothing new to you.
So, the question becomes, how do we change the stories, change the narratives, change the culture, so people hear us, center us, and see us the way we see and want to see ourselves? So we are treated not like humans but as humans, with the respect we so rightfully deserve.
One thing we can do, which may not seem like a big thing but can have a big impact if we all decide today to collaborate on this project, is to no longer hold our tongues and to tell our stories as often and as creatively as possible.
In February of 2019, I interviewed researcher, artist, and writer Mireya S. Vela for my podcast. She said so many things I have thought about daily since I met with her. She said that breaking through some of the stereotypes requires a lot of imagination. She said you cannot have empathy without imagination. She said you have got to be able to imagine people in all of these different roles. How can people say Latinx individuals are not more than what they see on TV if they look around and see that we are also more than the country’s nannies, farmworkers, pool boys, gardeners, etc. More than drug dealers, rapists, and criminals. We are also business owners, doctors, judges, politicians, scientists, professors, lifeguards, engineers, artists, poets, novelists, race car drivers, cowboys, police officers, teachers, students, musicians, and on and on and on.
Ms. Vela said, “You have to be able to imagine this stuff.” She said, “I think one of the things we maybe don’t do because it can be very hard is we do not expose ourselves for who we are. We do not stand in the authenticity of who we are and what we are able to do because it can be frightening. But in not telling people, in not communicating, in not saying something, we are not allowing other people to imagine what those roles could look like.”
Our silences will not protect us.
And, when those people continue with their stereotypes and caricatures about us, and we continue to bite our tongues, and our so-called progressive allies continue to hold their tongues because it’s an uncomfortable conversation to have, or because you or they don’t want to hurt the feelings of the offender, then these silences contribute to our own oppression. Sometimes all it takes is for someone to say to another, “Hey man, that’s not cool.” Sometimes all it takes is for someone to be able to imagine that someone like you, someone like me, can be so many other things than what they have been exposed to in the media, in the culture.
If the traditional gatekeepers will not expose us, center us, and represent us with the complexities of the full spectrum of our collective humanity and experiences, then it may be up to us and our allies to do so. We must continue to share our stories, not bite our tongues, and, whenever possible, amplify others and support organizations, politicians, businesses, and entertainment that do not exacerbate what oppresses us. And, if and when we gain some power in the system, we must not forget that such power also comes with a responsibility to the rest of the community.
Politics must change for much of our woes and institutionalized obstacles to fade and disappear, but most politics do not change without disruption, without demands, and without a cultural change that then drives politicians to want to be on the right side of history … a cultural change that proves to those afraid of us that there is nothing, nothing, to be afraid of, because, though different, we are, after all, just like them. Human. If they could only imagine it.
Let us help them (and us) imagine that we, too, are a powerful piece on that chessboard; and hopefully, one day, they will not only be able to imagine us as powerful, but also want to be like us. Let us aspire to be the queens on the chessboard, and let us spread our stories through arts, through poetry, through any creative pursuit possible so these stories, too, cross the borders that sometimes are the toughest to cross: the minds of those who hate and fear us.
An organization representative interviews Torres López to go deeper into his work and the main ideas of the keynote.
Torres López converses with the audience by entertaining their questions.

"I have come to know Julián as the embodiment of kindness itself. It is visible in the way he communicates with authors, in the interviews he conducts for The Nasiona Podcast, in the humbling and tireless way he is always giving a voice to others. It is what he has done for me, and countless young creatives, for which I am eternally grateful. With his ample experience with cultural organizations, combined with a personal background that imparts him with broad-mindedness, it’s little doubt he has, over the years, managed to rally such a vibrant community of readers, editors and artists around him. But above all, Julián is passionate, and one of the most dedicated advocates for social justice I have ever known. He is one of the best mentors I’ve ever had, and it’s a constant privilege to work with him."

— Aïcha Martine Thiam
Creative Director | Editor | Artist | Musician | Author of AT SEA and BURN THE WITCH
"We are deeply grateful to Julián Esteban Torres López for joining us for a workshop on Cultural Heritage Podcasting and a public talk on Decolonizing Storytelling. Both events were truly compelling. Julián engaged students and other audience members with his generative questions, incisive commentary, and passionate delivery. Students and other audience members left inspired to tell their own stories and to work toward social justice. We highly recommend working with him! [...] Thank you Julián for leading such an important conversation about the violence of settler colonialism and the importance of centering BIPOC stories. Also I’m now obsessed with The Nasiona Podcast and encourage everyone to check it out!"

— Dr. Katherine Gillen
Chair of Department of Language, Literature, and Arts @ Texas A&M University-San Antonio | Author of Chaste Value: Economic Crisis, Female Chastity, and the Production of Social Difference on Shakespeare’s Stage | Founder of Borderlands Shakespeare Colectiva
"I can’t begin to express how thankful I am to have people/professionals in my corner who are just as committed to DEI. I was just featured on The Nasiona Podcast for our work on the Authentic Voices program and I have to say, Julián Esteban Torres López is one of the most amazing human beings I have ever come to know. I am so honored."

— Natalie Obando
President of Women’s National Book Association | Founder and Chair of the Authentic Voices Fellowship Program | Publishing & Public Relations Consultant | Equity & Diversity in Publishing Consultant | Author | Screenwriter
"Julián embodies community and inspires the next generation of Latinx creators. When we first met at the Cruzando Fronteras event run by Central Americans for Empowerment (CAFE) at Chico State, Julián was an incredible professional speaker and passionate about helping our students. His presence was a guiding force and it felt like he invested so much time, patience, and wisdom into us in such a short amount of time. He was our biggest supporter, both attentive and kind in equal measure. We could tell that he wanted to see us succeed, not just on that day, but for everything else that was coming for us as individuals. Julián made us feel appreciated. I’d highly recommend working with Julián."

— Alondra Adame
Poet | Essayist | Lecturer @ California State University, Chico
"As an educator engaged with Critical Pedagogy, I admire how Julián’s public talk ‘Decolonizing Storytelling’ brought together actionable concepts in ways that encourage application in our classrooms and the lives of our students. Julián’s talk opened a space for important reflections on crucial topics for underrepresented communities such as political art, the politics of representation, and activism. In a personalized and honest manner, Julián exemplified Paulo Freire’s statement that ‘There is no true word that is not at the same time praxis’ (Pedagogy of the Oppressed 1970). Similarly, Julián demonstrates in his workshop ‘Cultural Heritage Podcasting’ and throughout his own artistic practice the value of listening and the empowerment that comes from producing and amplifying storytelling from the margins. In so doing, Julián reminds us that, ‘to speak a true word is to transform the world’ (Freire)."

— Dr. Alexandra Rodriguez Sabogal
Educator, Spanish + Latin American Culture and Literature
"He gets the class to reframe what the notion of literary art is. Not all poetry is meant to reside quietly and in the confines of the classroom; it is meant to be disruptive and provocative. Students went from hating to loving poetry because of Torres López."

— Dr. John Ernest
Chair of the English department @ University of Delaware | Professor of English | One of the world's top scholars on 19th Century African-American literature
"He plants the seeds, gets people going in the right direction."

— Caitlin Flynn
Artist
"Julián showcases the stories and experiences of cultures that have been undermined and othered. He knows that politics, economics, and any other social environment can change faster when culture is transformed. Julián truly knows how to create and use his platforms to center, elevate, and amplify the voices of the oppressed. Connect with Julián if you, too, are mission-driven and passionate about social justice! This incredible human being is here not only to give his advice towards podcasting but towards life. Julián gives us a gift!"

— Daniela Perea Morales
Co-Host of Smooth Podcast | Co-Founder & Production Director at Outcomes Rocket
"He is an educator and not all the educators are in front of the classroom."

— Sean McGhee
Former Director of the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs @ University of New Hampshire
"We need more allies like Julián Esteban Torres López. Thank you for the wonderful conversation with us [Teatro Luna] yesterday."

— Christina Igaraividez
Writer | Performer | Storytelling Coach | Co-Producer of the Audible Original Talking While Female & Other Dangerous Acts
"My mind is open and has been filled with concepts in such a deep, cognitive level that I actually feel tired... And I think that I could describe it, actually, as a jazz musician riffing. So, his thinking, his verbalizing, and he speaks with such eloquence in the things that he says, it reminds me of giving the stage to a jazz speaker. If that could exist, that's what it's like to listen to him. What an honor, too."

— The Scapegoat Guild Podcast
"[Julián] is an extraordinary storyteller from the same culture that produced Gabriel García Márquez. He understands the power of the story."

— Patrick A. Howell
Author of Dispatches from the Vanguard: The Global International African Arts Movement versus Donald J. Trump
"Julián is really, really wonderful about resetting ideas in a way that is deep but interesting, and that really makes me think. [...] The way that he verbalizes [ideas] is so unique to who he is as a person. It's just inspiring."

— Mireya S. Vela
Writer | Artist | Educator | Author of Vestiges of Courage: Collected Essays
"Julián is a true professional in a world of unrealistic claims."

— Allan Peterson
Historian | Independent Scholar
“As you’ll be able to tell when you listen to him speak, this is truly a person of all kinds of talent, and a brain to match this talent. And it is mind-blowing. Truly genius!”

— Andrea Auten
Writer | Writing specialist | Performance + Visual Artist | Arts Teacher
"Julián is the kind of person a creator needs to be in this modern era."

— Maris Lidaka
Filmmaker | Editor | Host of The Mixed Creator Podcast | Founder of The Blended Future Project
“A true artist!”

— Sarah Yamanaka
Writer | Editor | Creator

Speaking &

Training Services

Colonization has not ended. We are not in a post-colonial age in a similar way that we are not in a post-racial age. Colonization has simply become normalized, perpetuated by dominant culture narratives, and accepted by the majority as part of life.

The shadows and specters of colonialism and imperialism do not go away on their own. They haunt us until we conduct an exorcism. Join me in unlocking imagination's potential to shape a world founded on the liberating power of creativity and the creative power of liberation.

Keynotes • Workshops • Courses

Topics for Julián’s Offerings on Decolonizing Storytelling and Artistic Expression

Examples / Excerpts

of Keynotes

& Public Talks

Decolonizing Storytelling: From Survival to Liberation

a.k.a., A Continued Evolution Rather than a Fossilized Past: Decolonizing Storytelling

Colonial Legacy: A Personal Reckoning

Through Wind and Fire: Stories of Survival

The Colonial Machine: Erasing Culture, Enforcing Paradigms

Stories Before Stories: Interrogating Our Narrative Inheritance

Beyond the Arc: Indigenous Ways of Storying

Examining the Gatekeeper's Mirror

The Nasiona: Building a Decolonial Storytelling Movement

Rising, Reclaiming, Revolutionizing: The Path Forward

Interview of Julián Esteban Torres López

Q&A

Unleash Your Narrative: Empowerment Through Storytelling

a.k.a., To the Border Crossers: It’s Time to Start Biting Their Tongues Instead of Ours

The Power of Symbols and Storytelling in Reimagining Power Dynamics

The Personal and Societal Cost of Misrepresentation

Empowerment Through Representation and Reclaiming Our Stories

Disrupting Narratives: The Call for Recognition and Social Change

Imagining Change: The Power of Storytelling and Authenticity

Interview of Julián Esteban Torres López

Q&A

"He gets the class to reframe what the notion of literary art is. Not all poetry is meant to reside quietly and in the confines of the classroom; it is meant to be disruptive and provocative. Students went from hating to loving poetry because of Torres López."

"He plants the seeds, gets people going in the right direction."

"He is an educator and not all the educators are in front of the classroom."

"We need more allies like Julián Esteban Torres López. Thank you for the wonderful conversation with us [Teatro Luna] yesterday."

"[Julián] is an extraordinary storyteller from the same culture that produced Gabriel García Márquez. He understands the power of the story."

"Julián is really, really wonderful about resetting ideas in a way that is deep but interesting, and that really makes me think. [...] The way that he verbalizes [ideas] is so unique to who he is as a person. It's just inspiring."

"Julián is a true professional in a world of unrealistic claims."

“As you’ll be able to tell when you listen to him speak, this is truly a person of all kinds of talent, and a brain to match this talent. And it is mind-blowing. Truly genius!”

"Julián is the kind of person a creator needs to be in this modern era."

“A true artist!”