SPOTLIGHT ON MARIA OJASCASTRO

Weaving Art, Healing, and Resilience

For teaching artist Maria Ojascastro, creativity is inseparable from healing. Maria helped launch PPA's Arts & Healing program: a multi-disciplinary initiative of visual art, writing, and theatre that supports system-impacted individuals. Since its beginning, Maria has invited participants to explore resilience and transformation through creativity.

Finding Her Way to Arts & Healing

Maria’s first step into this work came in 2019, when she was invited to teach at the Transition Center of St. Louis (TCSTL) through an Anthropedia grant after completing 270 hours of Well-Being Coach training. At first, she hesitated—teaching justice-involved individuals wasn’t on her radar. But, as she explains, “the universe told me I had to do it.” Maria went in with a simple philosophy: “I’ll teach them the same way I teach any other students.” She quickly found the work deeply rewarding. When the grant funding ended, Maria continued as a volunteer while seeking new support. She had previously collaborated with Steve Knight, former Board President of PPA, through the Center of Creative Arts, and he encouraged her to invite PPA leadership to visit TCSTL.

That connection paved the way for something new. When COVID struck and volunteers were barred from entering the facility, Maria delivered art supplies and handmade masks to keep students engaged. Around that same time, PPA received funding for a pilot Arts & Healing program. With the Transition Center reopening to Zoom and limited in-person classes months before correctional facilities, Maria joined the PPA team and helped mold the program in its new form.

Transformation Through Creativity

Working alongside her Arts & Healing colleagues in writing and theatre has since become one of her favorite parts of the job. “It’s amazing how, when I respond to the same writing prompts as the students, the focus lands on what we share in common rather than what sets us apart,” she says. “It’s fun to join in the theatre games, and every time I cross-train with other disciplines, I grow as an artist.”

Her teaching philosophy blends creativity with resilience-building. She often compares Arts & Healing to athletics, reminding participants that, just as a football player must train in multiple ways—running, lifting, swimming—to build strength and resilience, artists cross-train by engaging in theatre, writing, and visual art. This multimodal practice, she explains, doesn’t just enrich creativity; it helps rewire the brain, building new connections that support growth and healing.

She has witnessed transformation firsthand. One participant, after years of drug use and failed programs, declared a new goal: to write a poem every day for a year. When he told Maria she was the one who inspired him to do it, she knew she was “exactly where I needed to be.”

An Artist’s Life in Color

Maria’s personal art practice mirrors the same themes she nurtures in her students. In college, her travels in the Philippines and Jamaica shaped her palette and textures, reflecting on her identity as a Filipino-American. Over time, she began to see her work differently. “It wasn’t until about ten years ago that I realized the art I make and the art I teach is for self-expression and to encourage change and awareness.” Today, she layers paint, prints, text, and found objects to create meditations on resilience, community, and metamorphosis. “The colors and textures are inspired by my journey of life—a combination of struggle, joy, and hope.”

That sense of care and transformation doesn’t end in the studio. When she’s not teaching or making art, Maria can often be found in her “magical garden,” alive with birdsong and bursting with color. “I cultivate whimsical bouquets for others, share the harvests of fruits and vegetables, and welcome bunnies, butterflies, and other small creatures into my creative ecosystem.” Like her classroom, her garden is a space where creativity and healing take root together.

Photo by Zachary Clingenpeel

This fall, Maria will share that vision with the wider community in her exhibition I’m Not Where I Started! at the Keystone Gallery at Five Oaks on Warson. The show features her own mixed-media works alongside collages created by graduates of the Arts & Healing program at the Transition Center of St. Louis. The opening reception takes place on Friday, October 3, from 6–8 PM, and the exhibition will remain on view through November 30. Admission is free, and the public is warmly invited to attend.

For Maria, art is not just something she makes or teaches—it’s a way of cultivating resilience, celebrating community, and finding joy in transformation. “I’m not where I started,” she says—and neither are her students.”