Join us as we share innovative meet inspiring artists and vision for a future of creativity and inclusion. Learn about successful immigrant artists and historic societal change as we reflect on their stories.

Soheil Parsa is the co-founder and former artistic director of Modern Times Stage Company and has directed over forty productions for the company since its inception in 1989. His work has been recognized with numerous awards and nominations. In 2021, Soheil received the Barbara Hamilton Memorial Award and the Canadian Association for Theatre Research Honorary Member Award for his unique contribution to Canadian theatre in the past thirty-two years.

Carmen Aguirre, Core Artist at Vancouver’s Electric Company Theatre and Artistic Associate of New Play Development at The Stratford Festival, is an award-winning theatre artist and author. She has written and co-written over twenty-five plays, the #1international bestseller Something Fierce: Memoirs of a Revolutionary Daughter (winner of CBC Canada Reads 2012), and its bestselling sequel, Mexican Hooker #1 and My Other Roles Since the Revolution. Currently, she is writing an adaptation of Euripides’ Medea, Moliere’s The Learned Ladies for Toronto’s Factory Theatre, Fire Never Dies: The Tina Modotti Project for Electric Company, and an adaptation of Linebaugh and Rediker ’s The Many-Headed Hydra for The Stratford Festival’s seed commission program. Her digital piece Floating Life, commissioned by Stratford, can be viewed on its website. Carmen has over eighty film, television and stage acting credits. Favourites include her award-winning work as Veronica in the Canadian premiere of Stephen Adly Guirgis’s The Motherfucker with the Hat and playing the lead role of Daniela in Cecilia Araneda’s stunning independent feature Intersection. Carmen is a 2020 Siminovitch Prize finalist, Canada’s most prestigious theatre award. She is a graduate of Studio 58. carmenaguirre.ca

Beatriz Pizano (Actor/ Director/Playwright) is the founder and Artistic Director of Aluna Theatre, a company recognized for its unique approach to creation, its daring political work, and its experimentation with multi-language productions. She has received a number of prestigious awards including the John Hirsch Prize, the Chalmers Fellowship, the K.M. Hunter award and numerous Dora awards and nominations.  She is the first Latinx actress to win a Toronto Critics award and a Dora for her performance in Blood Wedding.  In 2019 she was named one of TD’s 10 Most Influential Hispanic Canadians.