Tomoyuki Arai

Senior Program Officer, Yokohama International Performing Arts Meeting – YPAM

Born in Yokohama in 1974; a BA in literature from Waseda University; an MA in theatre and film arts from the university’s Graduate School of Letters, Arts and Sciences; archival work at the Tsubouchi Memorial Theatre Museum; technical work with Gekidan Kaitaisha; videomaking for movements aiming at the formation of labor unions by contingent workers and the abolition of nuclear weapons; a board member of Japan Center, Pacific Basin Arts Communication (PARC), where he directed Sound Live Tokyo (2014–2016) and currently serves as Senior Program Officer of Yokohama International Performing Arts Meeting (YPAM); dramaturg of four works by Singaporean visual artist Ho Tzu Nyen.

Chika Onozuka

Producer, Niwa Gekidan Penino

While studying at Meiji University, she began working in production for theater companies such as Niwa Gekidan Penino and Engeki Bento Neko-Nyaa.In 2005, she moved to Germany and joined productions at Deutsche Oper Berlin and Maxim Gorki Theater as a dramaturgy trainee.After returning to Japan in 2009, she joined Gorch Brothers and Niwa Gekidan Penino again, engaging in various production roles.Since then, she has worked on numerous productions, including at festivals such as Festival/Tokyo (F/T), TPAM – Performing Arts Meeting in Yokohama, and Yokohama Dance Collection, as well as company productions by Company Derashinera, Minamoza, and various other independent projects.

Kei Saito

Producer

Performing arts administrator/producer. He moved to Tottori from Tokyo in 2006 to take part in starting BIRD Theatre Company/BIRD Theatre and, for ten years, he has managed numerous programmes and projects. From March 2018 to February 2019, he was at Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh, Scotland, as a guest producer. He then spent three years from January 2020 to March 2023 at ROHM Theatre Kyoto working as a member of producing team. He is now based in Chizu, Tottori, working as a freelance producer, as well as setting up projects locally with Chizu Community Theatre.

Yoko Shioya

Artistic Director, The Japan Society, New York

Yoko Shioya became Artistic Director of Japan Society in 2006. The Society's 2024-2025 Performing Arts season marks the 20th anniversary since Yoko took the helm of the Performing Arts program. During her tenure, she has enlarged the scale and number of commissions to Americans and non-Japanese artists to create new works related to Japanese culture and increased the number of Society-produced/organized tours to distribute performing arts and music productions throughout North America. She also launched new projects such as Artists-in-Residency for Japanese artists and Annual Play Reading for English-translated contemporary Japanese plays.
For Japan Society's centennial celebration in 2007, Shioya conceived and materialized the first JAPAN CUTS: Festival of New Japanese Cinema, which is the largest festival of its kind and has become one of the signature annual summer events in New York City.
Known in Japan as a writer/researcher on the public and private arts support systems, Shioya has been invited to speak at numerous symposia, lectures, and TV programs presented by the Agency for Cultural Affairs of the Japanese government, Keidanren, the Academy of Cultural Economics and the Japan Council of Performers' Organizations, among others.
She has been a regular contributor to the Asahi Newspaper, writing columns on performing arts and exhibitions, and has served as a committee member and selection panelist for numerous programs, including The Herb Alpert Award in the Arts, The Bessie Awards, Rolex Mentor and Protege International Program, The MAP Fund, New England Arts Foundation, and the Toyota Choreography Awards. In 2019, Bessie Award awarded Shioya the "Bessies Presenter Award for Outstanding Curating." In 2023, the Ministry of Culture of the Taiwan Government awarded her the "Cultural Collaboration Medal." In August 2024, Shioya received the Commendation of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Japanese government for her contribution to promoting mutual understanding and friendship between Japan and the U.S. by showcasing Japanese performing arts. Shioya holds BAs in musicology and dance history from Tokyo University of the Arts.

Masaya Natsume

Stage Manager / Technical Director

Stage manager and technical director. Around 2005, he started working as stage manager. In 2013, he received training in Berlin as part of Program of Overseas Study for Upcoming Artists sponsored by Japanese Government’s Agency for Cultural Affairs. He has participated in numerous productions, mainly contemporary dance but also theatre, opera and concerts, and has worked with various artists including Tsuyoshi Shirai, Moriaki Watanabe, Toshiki Okada of chelfitsch, Jo Kanamori of Noism and Kuro Tanino of Niwagekidan Penino.

Yusuke Hashimoto

Artistic Director, Berliner Festspiele – Performing Arts Season

Yusuke Hashimoto was born in Fukuoka, Japan 1976 and studied aesthetics and art theory at the Kyoto University. He joined Berliner Festspiele which is a cultural institution belonging to the German Federal Government as the Head of Dramaturgy since 2022 and was appointed to the Artistic Director of Performing Arts Season of Berliner Festspiele since 2023, where he is presenting a range of outstanding international dance, theatre and performance productions at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele and Gropius Bau during the autumn and winter months. He founded Kyoto Experiment (Kyoto International Performing Arts Festival) in 2010 and led the festival as the artistic director until 2019. Since 2014 he had worked at ROHM Theatre Kyoto, the municipal theatre of Kyoto city as the programme director, including the preparation period. There, he had also worked with contemporary artists to create a new repertoire for the theatre, which has been performed in Japan and abroad. He was also a founding member and the president of Open Network for Performing Arts Management from 2013 to 2019.
He published a book Supporting the Arts -The Ecology of American Cultural Policies (2023), based on his research on the funding system of performing arts in United States.

Hiromi Maruoka

Director, Yokohama International Performing Arts Meeting – YPAM

From 1989 to 1998, she worked as a producer and actor with the theater company Gekidan Kaitaisha. Since 1991, she has been with the Japan Center, Pacific Basin Arts Communication (PARC), a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting international performing arts exchange, and was appointed President in 2011. From 2003 to 2004, she trained in New York through the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs’ Program of Overseas Study for Upcoming Artists. She has been involved in the performing arts market that preceded the Yokohama International Performing Arts Meeting (YPAM), the Tokyo Performing Arts Market (TPAM), since its inception in 1995, and has served in her current role since 2005. She also serves as Vice President of the Open Network for Performing Arts Management (ON-PAM), a non-profit organization. Her other projects include the Post-Mainstream Performing Arts Festival, the IETM Asia Satellite Meeting, and Sound Live Tokyo. In 2024, she was awarded the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology’s Art Encouragement Prize.