A few years ago, Dallas artist Giovanni Valderas decided to create new work that eventually inspired him to run for City Council. With council member Scott Griggs leaving next year because of term limits, Valderas is hoping to represent North Oak Cliff in District 1.

The inspiration for his activist artwork came as he was sitting in his car at a stoplight. He noticed commercial real estate signs where an affordable apartment complex used to be in his Oak Cliff neighborhood; it was a place he visited often as a child, because his cousins used to live there. Thinking about the people who were displaced after the building was torn down, he felt frustration, sadness and anger.

"All those people got evicted, and no one was talking about it," Valderas says. "And the place was about to get redeveloped."

He wasn't an attorney or a community organizer, but he wondered what he could do as an artist.

Dallas artist Giovanni Valderas left his sad-house piñatas on street corners to call attention to the plight of people in his native Oak Cliff, where much of the population is being displaced by gentrification. He says his art and activism have led him to run for a seat on the City Council. (Giovanni Valderas / )

"I decided to use my talents to bring this to the forefront," he says. "If developers were going to continue to go down this route, I at least wanted to make it known. My hope was that other people would feel the same way I do."

With a Latino audience in mind, the artist and assistant director of Kirk Hopper Fine Art created public guerrilla art installations. Using traditional piñata techniques, he made works that mimicked real estate signs with phrases like "No hay pedo," which translates as "No Problem," and "Ay te miro" ("I'll see you later"). Placed next to the real estate signs Valderas identified as forerunners of gentrification, the work started a dialogue.

Looking to expand his audience, Valderas kept thinking about how to confront the affordable housing crisis in Dallas. For his next public art project, "Casita Tristes (Little Sad Houses)," he created little piñata houses that looked like cartoons and placed them at construction sites. He left words out entirely and gave the houses sad faces.

He also gave people the opportunity to advocate for themselves by including postcards with the words, "All I want for Christmas is affordable housing." They were addressed to the mayor's office.

"They were meant for the community," Valderas says. "Who would've thought that cardboard boxes and tissue paper could get so big? People were moved by it. They started e-mailing me to share stories of how they were struggling. But they also thanked me for speaking up and asked what's next."

Valderas decided to run for office and resigned from the Cultural Affairs Commission on Sept. 1. He says he won't officially file until December, and the municipal election is in May, but he is ready to start a grassroots campaign now. As an artist and advocate working in the community, Valderas doesn't think running for office is a stretch.

Dallas artist Giovanni Valderas stands next to one of the pieces of his project called Casitas Tristas on Fort Worth Drive in Dallas on Jan. 14. He creates small houses to call attention to the lack of affordable housing in Oak Cliff, the neighborhood he grew up in. (Nathan Hunsinger / Staff Photographer)

"I wish more artists ran for office, because they are often the most creative problem-solvers," he says. "We know how to run a shoestring budget. Through art, we already know how to engage and motivate people. This city could benefit from more creative people running. We can't leave it up to developers and business people who are all about the money aspect of things. Imagine how much a community could change with an artist at the helm. There would be some crazy ideas, but it would be pretty fantastic."

Jeremy Hallock is a Dallas-based freelance writer