Announcing Our New Executive Director

The BC Alliance for Arts + Culture has announced the appointment of Brenda Leadlay as the organization’s new executive director.

“I am excited to join the BC Alliance for Arts + Culture and lead its membership into the future,” said Leadlay. “My mission will be to ensure that all British Columbians understand the value of arts and culture and the important role they play in the quality of our lives.”

Leadlay has been the artistic executive director of Canada’s Magnetic North Theatre Festival at Ottawa’s National Arts Centre since 2011. 

Her thirty-five year career in professional theatre has included experience as an actor, co-creator, director, dramaturge, movement teacher and producer. Before moving to Ottawa, Leadlay spent most of her career in Vancouver, where she was the artistic director of Tamahnous Theatre and the artistic and managing director of North Vancouver’s Presentation House Theatre and Vancouver’s Norman Rothstein Theatre. She was the founder, in 2001, of the Chutzpah! Festival. 

Leadlay has an MFA in directing from the University of British Columbia and has been nominated three times for Jessie Richardson awards for her work as a director and collaborator.

“We are thrilled to welcome Brenda back to Vancouver,” said Alliance interim board president Kirsten Schrader. “Brenda brings a lifetime of success and experience to the position of executive director. During her time in Ottawa, she fostered important relationships with federal funders and cultural stakeholders, which will serve the Alliance well. She is a visionary and will lead the organization through a new period of growth as it expands throughout the province.”

Leadlay will assume her new role at the Alliance for Arts + Culture in August.