As a theatre maker, director and currently co Artistic Director of Boca del Lupo in Vancouver BC I’ve been creating intimate immersive installations, made work inside theatres, and created large scale site activations for over 20 years. 

My productions have toured across Canada, Latin America and Europe, with commissions and premiers at theatres and at festivals.  

In addition to more traditional venues, my work has brought artists and audiences to old growth forests with performers rigged up 40 to 75 feet in the tree tops, to darken shipping containers experiencing the auditory journey of crossing the Pacific, under the ocean waters where we follow an archeologist 150 years into the future.  I’ve worked on an interactive installation about climate change and our relationship to the guilt and isolation that people carry, involving the audience charging a battery on a stationary bicycle, a giant puppet piece that brings audiences into the imagined life of these creatures on land, ocean and sky.  

As theatre maker my passion for creating new performance with Boca del Lupo and through collaborative pursuits has instigated international co productions with Mexico, Argentina, Ireland and South Korea. 

As a director, workshop facilitator and teacher I’ve freelanced for companies and schools in Vancouver and across Canada. During my tenure Boca del Lupo has received numerous awards including the Alcan Performing Arts Award, Jessie Richardson awards, and the Critics Choice Award for Innovation and I have been nominated for the national Siminovitch Prize for directing. 

Past committee work includes: the Studio 58 Arts Advisory, Canada Council’s REAC committee, the Arts Advisory for Theatre Section and the BC Arts Council Advisory.  I’ve launched the 3.7% local and National Leadership Initiatives – and advocacy group to support emerging and established BIPOC women and non binary artists in leadership, and since the pandemic, Stop Asian Hate, an initiative that has galvanized Asian Canadian Leadership in the performing arts across Canada to help stop the spread of anti- Asian sentiments through connection and support within our communities.

An inventor, creator and entrepreneur, Jay’s imagination for the what, how and why of theatre defies conventional boundaries . During his tenure, the company has won the peer-assessed Alcan Performing Arts Award, and several Jesse Richardson Theatre Awards including seven nominations for the Critic’s Choice Award for Innovation and the Patrick O’Neill Award for best anthology with Plays2Perform@Home. Jay is a passionate set and video designer with Jessie Richardson Awards in both of those categories as well as a published playwright including a contribution to Boca del Lupo’s Red Phone project. His artistry is one of innovation and daring and his one man show, PHOTOG. featured interactive video, stunt rigging and verbatim text, touring to World Stage, Prismatic, Festival Trans Amerique and PuSh. Having served as President on the national board of the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres, Jay also has special interest in creative space making including as co-founder of celebrated colocation space PL1422, co-founder of the Granville Island Theatre District. Happiest when he is tinkering in his studio with collaborators from a diverse range of disciplines and backgrounds, the impact of Jay’s influence is quiet yet profound.

Hiro Kanagawa is a Vancouver-based actor and writer perhaps best-known for his 200-plus film and television roles ranging from Best in Show and art house shorts to hit shows like Smallville, Altered Carbon and Star Trek: Discovery. Behind the camera he was story editor on several critically-acclaimed Canadian television series: Da Vinci’s Inquest, Da Vinci’s City Hall, Intelligence and Blackstone. As a playwright, he received the 2017 Governor-General’s Literary Award for Drama for his play, Indian Arm. His latest play, an adaptation of Mark Sakamoto’s best-selling memoir, Forgiveness, premiered in January, 2023 in an Arts Club Theatre / Theatre Calgary co-production directed by renowned director Stafford Arima. A long-time collaborator with Boca del Lupo, Hiro’s other works with the company include plays2perform@home, the Micro Performance piece Azano and co-writing the full-length play Hold Your Head Tight.