The Model Minority 2022 Artists

The Model Minority Project features Asian Canadian artists in contemporary and traditional multidisciplinary arts. Together we work with the stories submitted to the project from people across the country and express them on stage to share with audiences.

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Carley Okamura
Carley is the director and founder of the Model Minority project and performance series. She was inspired to create these productions to explore Asian Canadian voices and stories on historical and contemporary topics, and spotlight Asian Canadian artists. Carley’s main discipline is Japanese drumming. She is a board member for the Taiko Community Alliance, and President of Kita no Taiko, Alberta’s oldest Japanese drumming group. Through her company, Rabbits Three Cultural Connections, she creates novel and collaborative music and performance pieces intended to uplift cultural performance in Edmonton’s vibrant arts community.

Matthew Wood “Creeasian”
Matthew is an entrepreneur, youth educator, dancer, DJ, producer, and tours as a dancer with the Juno Award winning group A Tribe Called Red. He is committed to bridging hip-hop and Indigenous culture, using the arts to empower and unite youth. Matthew is a recipient of the 2020 Edmonton Artists’ Trust Fund award and was the 2021 Indigenous Artist in Residence for the City of Edmonton.

Shrina Patel
Born and raised in Amiskwacîwâskahikan Edmonton, Alberta, Shrina is a choreographer, actor, yoga teacher and the Artistic Director of Shaktiflow on Treaty 6 land. Her work is based on story-telling with a focus on socio-cultural and gender inequality. For over 15 years, she has collaborated with many local artists and organizations within and surrounding Edmonton, to bring South Asian dance styles to the mainstream and establish her signature choreography. In 2019, she produced and directed her first show Sacred Spaces, in which diverse forms of dance and music illustrated the importance of safe spaces within society. Her company, Shaktiflow, uses dance, theatre, and yoga to help heal and empower the individual.

Maya Pillay
Maya graduated from Marr Mac Dance Studio in June 2021, where she started her dance journey at 3 years old. She has trained and danced competitively in many styles over the years including Tap, Hip Hop, Jazz, Lyrical, Contemporary, Ballet, Highland, and Bollywood/Traditional Indian.

She has completed up to her Silver SDTA Highland exams and has attended workshops and performance opportunities offered by Disney’s Performing Arts Company. She has danced and modelled in multiple locally filmed music videos, including both Western and Punjabi style. Maya has also made appearances in magazines internationally for her modelling work. She is now a Pro-Basketball dancer for the Edmonton Stingers of the Canadian Elite Basketball League, and is also a part of the Three Point Dance Performance Company.

Hitoshi Sugiyama
Born and raised in Japan, Hitoshi has made music a part of his life starting with taiko and shinobue (flute) as a child. During university, he moved away from the traditional music of his youth and began composing electronic music.
Hitoshi moved to Canada in 2009. He joined a band and they wrote a soundtrack for a short film as well as performing. He then returned to his roots, combining taiko and shinobue with electronic music and performed locally. Hitoshi released his first album of ambient/experimental electro-acoustic music under the name ‘Gozu Mezu’ this year.

Keiko Marumo
Keiko is a bicultural Japanese/ Francophone Canadian. Through her active membership with the Edmonton Japanese Community Association, she became interested in Japanese drumming.
She began her apprenticeship with Kita no Taiko in 2013. Shortly after, she performed in their major production ‘Ki’ in 2014 and since then performs regularly with KNT and teaches in their public workshops. By day Keiko is a registered massage therapist, to the benefit of her fellow drummers with their sore muscles!

Nanyen Lau
Born and raised in Edmonton, Nanyen began learning the erhu at the age of 11 under the instruction of erhu master Zhang Bing. In 2012 she passed the performer’s level examination for erhu issued by the Central Conservatory of Music in China. Between 2017 and 2018, Nanyen spent a year in Beijing studying music performance at the Central Conservatory under the tutelage of renowned erhu player Tian Zai Li. Nanyen is an active member of the Edmonton Chinese Philharmonica Orchestra and Echo Ensemble and performs for many of Edmonton’s various Chinese cultural functions. She also teaches erhu to students in elementary school programs.

Jia Jia Yong
Jia Jia is a harpist and composer passionate about sharing music and exploring the versatility of the harp in different musical traditions and performance arts. She performs as a freelance musician at various events in the Edmonton area and also enjoys developing collaborative projects with other musicians and artists. Currently, Jia Jia is exploring and discovering new ways to engage musically in celebrating cultural art forms and heritage in contemporary performance art. She is thrilled to be a part of The Model Minority Project along with other amazing Asian Canadian artists in the community!

Korock Korean Drummers
Korock was established in 2014 with seven members in Edmonton. Korock is an abbreviation of “Koreans Rock” in English. In Korean, ‘korock’ sounds like [ka-rak] which represents a type of music that synchronizes beats and rhythms with low, mid, and high tones.
Korean drumming performance has origins in the roots of Korean culture. You are going to see the rhythms of traditional Korean percussions.

Jeon’s Traditional Taekwondo
Taekwondo comes from three Korean words, tae, “kick,” kwon, “fist or punch,” and do, “the art of.” That’s a pretty good description of this dynamic martial art, which involves acrobatic kicks and graceful punches. Jeon’s TKD offer all ages of students the best in martial arts training and an enjoyable experience while making the commitment to learn and improve one’s self esteem, concentration, discipline and self control.

Teiya Kasahara 笠原貞野 (they/them)
Nikkei-Canadian settler Teiya is a queer, trans non-binary, interdisciplinary creator-performer based in Tkarón:to, recently featured in a CBC short-doc OPERA TRANS*FORMED. Heralded as “an artist with extraordinary things to say” (The Globe and Mail), Teiya comes from a background of over a decade of singing both traditional and contemporary operatic roles across North America and Europe and explores the intersections of identity through opera, theatre, and electronics within their artistic practice (THE QUEEN IN ME; 夜 YORU; THE BUTTERFLY PROJECT). Teiya, a co-founder of Amplified Opera, which is currently the Disruptor-in-Residence at the Canadian Opera Company.

The Chinese Freemasons Society Tai Chi Program
The Chinese Freemason Society branch of Edmonton was founded in 1954 as an outpost of the national Chinese Freemason Society headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia. The aims of the group were to preserve and promote Chinese culture within the larger, multicultural community, as well as provide members with recreational and social activities.

Dr. Neeja Bakshi
Neeja is an Edmonton area physician working at the Royal Alexandra Hospital and Park Integrative Health. She is an advocate for inclusive and accessible healthcare delivery. When not practicing medicine, she is spending time with her favourite people – her twin daughters and her husband.

Serena Mah
Serena is a dynamic storyteller who founded her own public relations consulting firm after two decades of reporting on CBC and CTV news as a journalist. She now shares her insight as a through videography, social media management and media outreach and management. She is also a sought after media trainer, emcee and moderator. She is a mother to a young teen and a beagle. She is committed to social justice and is advancing human rights and true inclusion.

Shawn Tse 謝兆龍
Shawn (he/him) is a father, artist and community organizer living in ᐊᒥᐢᑲᐧᒋᐋᐧᐢᑲᐦᐃᑲᐣ (amiskwacîwâskahikan/ Edmonton). He is a video director for Fallout Media– creator of the intergenerational cooking show, Seconds, Please!, actor and coordinator for Third Space Playback Theatre, and member of aiya哎呀 (artist collective) who dream new futures for Chinatown.