Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Aaron Castillo-white. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Aaron, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Do you wish you had started sooner?

Graduating into the height of the Great Recession, and without a safety net, I focused first and foremost on securing my finances. The opening years of my career were wasted on overwork and hustling in too many side jobs and gigs to count, with a single-minded focus on paying off my loans. As a result, my creative life and emotional well-being suffered.

Moving to Los Angeles in 2016 sparked many changes, a change of scenery, a change of culture, and a change in my outlook due to several chance encounters.

I met two men in their 90s at the Bagel Broker in Los Angeles shortly after moving. The two conversed in Yiddish, and I spoke with the broken phrases I remembered from my grandfather. The way they lit up and grew excited to hear their childhood language, long repressed and marginalized, got me into revisiting the language and led to today, where I am actively working towards its secular revival.

At the time, I worked for a nonprofit focused on middle-east peace and spent my free time tabling for a distro and making crafts with my roommates who worked, and continue to work, around entertainment and fashion.

I wasn’t very focused in my work and was often afraid to share my personal work – translations, writing, you name it.

It took a lot of encouragement from friends and family to grow my confidence to the place where I started sharing, submitting, and now working towards hosting cultural events.

If I could go back in time, I would have forced myself to start earlier, to learn to better take on criticism and to remind my younger self that the old saying is true, you are your own harshest critic.

When you first start out on pretty much anything, unless you are some kind of saavnt, you have to hone your craft and your work.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I started Kultur Mercado as a reaction to a growing body of research that has shown while the United States has grown more diverse, and has come to hold more languages, customs, and cultures, for many Americans, their relationships have not.

There is some dispute about the loneliness epidemic, but little discussion at all about our cultural one.

I noticed at an event about Mexican history that I was one of maybe two or three non-Mexican or Mexican-American attendees, an experience I encountered at events later at the Japan Foundation, the Goethe-Institut, and a remembrance event around the Armenian genocide.

One of the questions I often encountered, especially from older generations and immigrants, is why, among everyone, is their story disappearing, even now, while they still breathe?

It comes down to relationships. Kultur Mercado focuses on cross-cultural events, looking for common or shared space, history, identity, or practice among peoples to help build community between them and to build a bridge that helps inform those outside the community while preserving its memory for those within it.

While much of our work today is still centered around endangered Jewish languages and identities, we are slowly growing our outreach and programs to better partner and connect with other communities to help center them and create a space for them in ways that attracts those from around the broader community.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most rewarding aspect of being a creative, especially in my role as the Executive Director of Kultur Mercado— is seeing the way people light up when they feel connected to an event, a story, or a tradition that speaks to them.

I love bringing cross-cultural experiences to life, creating spaces both in-person and online, where people can learn about different histories, and fostering moments of discovery and connection. There’s something incredibly fulfilling about watching attendees realize they share something in common with a culture they may not have known much about before.

Those moments of recognition, curiosity, and engagement are what fuel my passion for this work because creativity isn’t just about expression — it’s about building bridges between people.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

Society can best support artists and creatives by investing in spaces and opportunities that foster cross-cultural engagement, storytelling, and artistic exploration.

As the Executive Director of Kultur Mercado, I’ve seen firsthand how transformative it is when people have access to creative events that connect them to histories, traditions, and perspectives beyond their own. But beyond funding and resources, appropriate representation matters. Representation ensures that diverse voices, histories, and artistic traditions are included and valued.

For a fully functioning multicultural democracy to thrive, we need to find the ways in which we connect with one another.

Books in translation offer profound insights into other communities, giving us a window into different ways of thinking and living.

Shared elements of language—whether it’s a word with a surprising etymology or a phrase that carries meaning across cultures—can spark conversations and create moments of connection.

By identifying shared values, we can strengthen our bonds and reinforce civil society, particularly in today’s challenging environment. Art, creativity, and cultural exchange don’t just enrich our lives, they are essential tools for building understanding, empathy, and a society that truly reflects and respects all of its people.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.kulturmercado.org/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kulturmercado/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KulturMercado
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kultur-mercado/
• Twitter: http://x.com/kultumercado
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChPo4nuN-3S_fYF2ZDwhWKQ

Image Credits

Aaron Castillo-White