(audience cheering and applause) JULIO: Wow.

It's a, it's a statement piece.

Um, hello, hi, hi, thank you, thank you, thank you so much for coming here just to hand me this beautiful necklace, thank you.

Um, I, uh, um, unfortunately did write a little something.

Um, thank you so much, covered that.

(audience laughs).

Um, uh, so, okay.

If you don't, if you don't know me, I, my name is, is Julio.

I am, I think the best way to explain it is I'm a little, I'm a little Eugenio Derbez most more Walter Mercado.

(audience laughs) Um... (audience cheering and applause) Thank You.

(audience cheering and applause) Uh, he would've, he would've loved, loved the, the design.

Um, I, uh, I, you know, I, I did, uh, Washington, D.C. is very, very, uh, very intimidating and, and scary to me, uh, because I, it's, it's just not, it's not my world.

And I, I, I don't know who's who.

Uh, so if, if, just do me a favor and if, you know, if, if you make money making weapons or you're in like a Anna Delvy kind of journey, just don't, don't ask me for a picture.

I... (audience cheering and applause) I just don't... (audience cheering and applause) I, I, I, I, I really don't want to be in the documentary later.

I, I really, really, really, really don't.

Um, you know, I, I, I've been thinking a lot about this idea of, of vision, um, uh, given the, the, the, the Vision Award, uh, and about this idea of who is seen and, and who isn't.

Uh, recently I, I watched, um, uh, this, this tiny Indie film, uh, a "Top Gun," uh, the, um, the, the latest one.

Uh, and I, I was, I was really, really rooting for the characters and I, I was really bonding with, with the protagonists.

And then I, I saw, I realized that the movie intentionally doesn't show you the enemy pilots.

You never see, you never see them.

You see them from afar or they're always wearing a helmet.

You never get a clear shot of their, of their faces or their names.

We don't know anything other than they're supposed to be bad.

And I, I think that my work examines this idea of who gets to be seen and who doesn't, and why, uh... (audience cheering and applause) Who, who gets the benefit of empathy, uh, and who is a nameless, faceless part of a mask trying to say, cross the border, uh, and just to have a better future with their families, or who is, is nameless and, and is just part of a mass, of, of people being, being bombed to their cities, wiped out completely.

(audience cheering and applause) Um, because, you know, what, uh, making weapons is, is very lucrative.

I, I've heard, uh, and, and surveillance is also very lucrative.

Uh, but empathy, empathy is actually very dangerous to greed, uh, because it would be very, very costly for those, uh, in power if we truly, truly started seeing those who they tell as our enemies.

Stories get more complicated if we start to feel for those who they tell us are criminals or those who just tell us are necessary casualties for a just war.

(audience cheering and applause) I feel, I feel, I feel very, very seen by, by this award.

And I, and I'm very aware that being seen as a, a, as a privilege, and I, and I, I really, really, really mean to honor it.

Um, and I will continue to do so.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

(audience cheering and applause)