Keshia Palm (they/them)

Keshia is a Toronto-based storyteller of Filipinx-German descent seeking to spark connection and conversation through live, shared experiences in thoughtful and inclusive art/spaces — as a director, dramaturge, performer, producer, and playwright, depending on the day!

Keshia has developed and performed new works with companies across Canada including vAct, Theatre SKAM, Cahoots Theatre, Carlos Bulosan Theatre, and fu-GEN. They are the dramaturge for a number of works in development by IBPOC, queer, immigrant + newcomer, women, and trans artists. Keshia was the 2022/2023 Resident Dramaturge for Puente Theatre and is the Interim Program Director for Nightwood Theatre’s 2023/2024 Write from the Hip.

Keshia is honoured to be the Artistic Producer of the Paprika Festival for their 3rd season, celebrating the work of young and emerging artists across Turtle Island. They stewarded ArtistProducerResource.com as online content producer from 2018-2021 — a wikipedia for producing independent theatre hosted by Generator. Before that, they were the lead coordinator of Reading the 49, a monthly play-reading series hosted by fu-GEN that promoted under-produced and un-produced plays by women of colour.

Keshia co-created, designed and directed Shadow Girls with Claren Grosz, a queer love story scored entirely with overhead projector art. Shadow Girls was presented at the Rhubarb Festival in 2017 followed by a full-length production at the Gladstone Hotel in 2018 with Pencil Kit Productions and Blank Canvas. They created Make me an Alleycat with wheels from Claren Grosz — a digital community arts project inviting people to connect over stories and destinations by going for a bike ride. Keshia was a playwright in the 2020/2021 Hot House Lab at Cahoots Theatre, and the 2022/2023 MSG Lab at Vancouver Asian-Canadian Theatre.

Select performance credits include: The Cherry Orchard (Modern Times); Lieutenant Nun (Theatre SKAM, SNAFU, Puente Theatre), FEARLESS (fu-GEN).

Keshia completed a BFA specializing in performance from the University of Victoria. They trained with Peter Balkwill and Shannan Calcutt at the Banff Puppet Intensive, Eric Rose at Ghost River Theatre, David Anderson at Clay and Paper Theatre, and with Vermont-based Bread and Puppet Theater Touring Company. They mentored under Marjorie Chan as dramaturgy intern at Cahoots Theatre and Nina Lee Aquino as a Factory Theatre Foreman in 2018/2019.

In 2023, they were invited to join the European Theatre Academy, where theatre professionals from across Europe and North Africa gathered in Avignon to discuss and develop international theatre collaborations with mentorship and expert lectures from leading professionals of the international theatre scene.

If you like lists, you can see Keshia’s online CV here.