Menon Dwarka

Menon Dwarka (he/him/his) has held executive director, artistic director, and community arts leadership positions in Canada and the United States over the last 25 years. Whether it’s hosting digital town halls, implementing project management tools for large and small organizations, winning Digital Strategies Fund grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, or introducing electronic music programs with Morton Subotnick at the 92^nd Street Y, Harlem School of the Arts, and Greenwich House Music School, Dwarka’s innovative approach and focus on equity, diversity, inclusion, and access has always resulted in engaging audiences and developing community. His expertise resides in leveraging technology in service of creating more diverse programming and administrative spaces, as well as applying a post-colonial lens to IDEAS initiatives.

A disruptor of stratified ecosystems, Dwarka supports both large and small arts and culture organizations. He has led grassroots organizations like Toronto’s 918 Bathurst Centre and served as a board member of Canadian Opera Company, guiding its equity, diversity, and inclusion taskforce. His cross-sector work to achieve public/private sector partnerships, such as his planning and capacity building work for QuadReal developers, demonstrates his unique ability to work with a variety of stakeholders to ensure the viability of arts spaces and venues across urban and suburban settings.

Regarding development work in the arts, Dwarka has been a peer assessor for the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Manitoba Arts Council, City of Ottawa, and Toronto Arts Council, where he currently sits on the Music Committee. Organizations that he has led have received support from all three levels of government, as well as the Metcalf and Jackman Foundations, among others.

A sought-after public speaker, Dwarka has been featured on CBC Television, WBAI Radio, TVOntario’s The Agenda, and The Walrus Talks. He appears on a regularly occurring segment on Sesame Street. He was part of the inaugural cohort of the Banff/Toronto Arts Council Cultural Leaders Lab as well as the City of Toronto’s Economic Development and Culture’s Strategic Planning Committee, which oversaw the creation of Toronto’s 2018-2022 Culture Plan. In addition, Dwarka served as Support Lead for the Metcalf Foundation’s Creative Strategies Incubator and as a board member for MusicWorks Magazine, and previously presided as a board member for CanAsian Dance and the Chamber Factory. He is Chair of Humber College’s Program Advisory Committee and Canadian Opera Company’s Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee. He holds a bachelor of music and master of music in music composition from the University of Toronto.