Menon Dwarka founded MPD Culture Consultants to help arts and culture organizations become clearer, stronger, and more aligned with their missions.

With more than 30 years of experience in Canada and the United States, Menon has worked as an executive director, artistic director, educator, consultant, board member, and community arts leader. His practice brings together executive search, strategic planning, organizational culture, technology, and equity-informed change.

Menon’s work is grounded in the belief that arts organizations are not only producers of programs. They are civic spaces where identity, belonging, leadership, and public imagination are shaped. His approach applies a post-colonial and intersectional lens to Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Access, and Success initiatives, helping organizations move beyond statements of intent and toward practical change in programming, governance, staffing, and community relationships.

Menon has led organizations at many scales. In Toronto, he served as both Artistic Director and Executive Director of 918 Bathurst Centre. He has also served on the board of the Canadian Opera Company, where he chaired the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee. In the United States, he led the music departments at the 92nd Street Y and Harlem School of the Arts and served as Executive Director of Greenwich House Music School.

As Senior Vice President at Arts Consulting Group, Menon completed organizational equity and IDEAS audits for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Arraymusic, and the Toronto Musicians’ Association. Through MPD Culture Consultants, he now works with arts and culture organizations to align people, culture, and impact.

My Background

Menon's cross-sector work has established public/private sector partnerships and ensured the long-term sustainability of arts spaces and venues in urban and suburban settings through strategic planning and capacity-building efforts for QuadReal developers.

Menon is a public speaker and has been featured on platforms including CBC Television, WBAI Radio, TVOntario's The Agenda, and The Walrus Talks. His expertise is also showcased through regular appearances on Sesame Street. He was a part of the inaugural cohort of the Banff/Toronto Arts Council Cultural Leaders Lab and served on the City of Toronto's Economic Development and Culture's Strategic Planning Committee, a group specifically formed to advise the City on the creation of Toronto's 2018-2022 Culture Plan.

Menon’s past clients including Alberta Ballet, Array Music, Artpark, Boston Lyric Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Center of Creative Arts – St. Louis, Indigenous Curatorial Collective, Hannaford Silver Street Band, José Mateo Ballet Theatre, Levitt Pavilion Denver, Miami City Ballet, Museum of North Vancouver, Parsons School of Design, Peninsula Youth Orchestra, Phoenix Boys Choir, Printed Matter, Reel Asain Film Festival, Royal Ontario Museum, Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra, Textile Museum of Canada, Toronto Musicians Association, Toronto Public Library, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, and Wavelength Music Festivals and Workman Arts.

Menon holds BMus and MMus degrees in Music Composition from the University of Toronto, and was an ABD Ph.D. candidate at SUNY Stony Brook.