Ontario

Taya Mikado

Taya Mikado (she/her) is a mixed-race Japanese-Canadian Yonsei hailing from Southern Alberta but currently anchored in Tkaronto. She dabbles in poetry, prose and digital art while working towards becoming an innovative and compassionate lawyer. Losing her father to suicide at 13, and her mother to a motorbike accident at 18, has given Taya significant insight […]

Michelle Yagi

Michelle (she/her) is an international producer and arts leader with diverse experience working for dozens of theatres, festivals, dance companies and entertainment agencies across Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom. She has held a variety of different roles in development, marketing and project management, and has worked with companies such as Shakespeare’s Globe, […]

Lara Okihiro

Dr. Lara Okihiro is a yonsei writer, researcher, and educator of mixed Japanese Canadian heritage. Growing up in the diverse, working-class Dixon Road neighbourhood in Toronto, she was close to her Japanese Canadian grandparents and often visited her Anglo-Irish Canadian grandmother on her rural Ontario farm. Though Lara did not like reading as a kid, […]

Kaylie Hatashita(Kaylie Kreatrix)

Pronoun: She/Her Multi-disciplinary performer, Kaylie is a circus artist, musician, and all round creative soul born in Ottawa, Ontario. Growing up she studied violin and dance, and as an adult she discovered circus arts. What started as a hobby quickly turned into a passion and obsession. She traveled the world teaching and performing ‘buugeng’ an […]

Takako Segawa

Takako Segawa is a contemporary dancer, choreographer, movement coach, dance-theatre performer, and teacher of Japanese Arts. Born in Japan, Takako trained in both traditional arts and contemporary Japanese movement styles, before graduating from the London Contemporary Dance School. Her 20-year career includes performances throughout Europe, Asia, and North America. She was nominated outstanding female for […]

Alexa Hatanaka

Alexa Hatanaka engages in time-intensive, historic processes connected to her Japanese heritage that support her thinking around community-building, environment, and honouring evolving cultural practices such as relief-printmaking, papermaking and kamiko, the practice of sewing garments out of konnyaku starch-strengthened washi (Japanese paper). Her seminal work “Hazmat Suit (unborn/ reborn tsunami)” was acquired by the National […]

Machiko Townson

Born and raised in the birthplace of Japanese porcelain, Arita, Saga, Machiko grew up where not only her grandmother was a dish painter, but most of her neighbours were dish painters themselves. Machiko remembers watching her grandmother painting dishes at home every night after school. Needless to say, she enjoyed her art classes in elementary […]

Kate Kamo McHugh

Kate Kamo McHugh is a dance and theatre artist from Kitchener, Ontario. Recent highlights include an artist residency at the National Arts Centre, presenting a solo piece at IMPACT 21 Theatre Festival, and performing with Cosmic Fishing Theatre. In 2021 Kate co-facilitated a movement-based workshop for the Newcomer Youth Program in partnership with MT Space […]

Leanne Toshiko Simpson

Leanne Toshiko Simpson is a mixed-race Yonsei writer and psychiatric survivor from Scarborough, Ontario. She is a graduate of UTSC Creative Writing and the University of Guelph’s MFA program. Currently, she is a doctoral student in Social Justice Education at the University of Toronto, studying the intergenerational impact of Japanese Canadian internment. She teaches courses […]

Melisa Kamibayashi -Staples

Melisa trained in and performed taiko with an all women’s taiko group in Japan in the 90’s. She went on to participate in International taiko conferences in Los Angeles and Sacramento, and workshops with Grandmaster Seiichi Tanaka, KODO, GONNA, Burlington Taiko, Arashi Taiko and Kiyoshi Nagata. Former performer and Artistic Director of Oto-Wa Taiko, delivering […]

Hiromi Okuyama

Hiromi Okuyama was born and raised in Toronto. Her father is Shotokan Karate Master Kancho T. Okuyama who is originally from Hachijojima Island in Japan. Her mother Belle is originally from Hong Kong. Hiromi is an Actress, Martial Artist and Content Creator. The bulk of her acting work is in commercials with over 30 years […]

Hiroki Tanaka

Hiroki Tanaka is a musician, artist and writer born in Toronto, Ontario. He grew in Toronto’s east end, in the area formerly known as “East York”. He attended Concordia University in Montreal to study Creative Writing and Music, where he would focus on poetry and songwriting. This is also where he initially met members of […]

Miyeko Ferguson

Miyeko Ferguson is a Tkaronto / Toronto based dance artist. She graduated from Toronto Metropolitan University’s Performance Dance program. She has worked with choreographers such as Laurence Lemieux, James Kudelka, Peggy Baker, Naishi Wang, Jera Wolfe, Kate Hilliard, Jennifer Nichols, Julia Aplin, and Vicki St. Denys. She has performed with Compagnie de la Citadelle, Canadian […]

Douglas Haruki Oyama Peerless

Douglas is a Nisei 二世 (2nd generation) Japanese-Canadian actor, writer, and storyteller from Toronto, Ontario. He has a wide range of performance experience including musical theatre, children’s theatre, voice acting, and Shakespeare. He studied theatre at the University of Victoria’s Phoenix Theatre, graduating with his bachelor’s degree in performance. Favourite roles include Max in The […]

Mayumi Lashbrook

Lashbrook performs with an “electric” and “life-giving” connection (The Fringe Review, John Hinton). Mayumi Lashbrook is a mixed race Japanese Canadian settler from Tkaronto who seeks to expose, challenge, and rectify systems of oppression by creating innovative, introspective and inclusive dance theatre. Her primary practises span performance, choreography, education and Artistic Direction. She performs as […]