The Team

Jacqueline Ko's headshot. A Chinese-Canadian woman with long, wavy black hair stares confidently at the viewer, lips quirked and brow lifted, hands on her hips. She is wearing a wine-red satin dress and wine-red lipstick, plus a black jacket with ornate silver buttons.

Image description: Headshot of Jacqueline Ko, a disabled Chinese-Canadian woman with long hair and bangs wearing a black blazer, wine-coloured dress and lipstick, and a confident expression.

Jacqueline Ko

Artistic Director​

Jacqueline Ko (she/her) is a multi-award-winning soprano who “knows exactly what to do with an absolutely gorgeous voice” (Review Vancouver). A versatile performance and recording artist whose work spans opera, theatre and film, a few of her notable role highlights include Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte, Angelica in Suor Angelica, Sharon in Master Class, Lauretta and La Ciesca in Gianni Schicchi and the Queen of the Night in The Magic Flute. She has been praised for her “definite aptitude” (Opera Canada) as the founding artistic director of Opera Mariposa, and is also an internationally-recognized disability and chronic illness advocate who has raised over $125,000 to date for chronic neuroimmune diseases such as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), with which she has lived since age six. Thanks to her work advancing disability visibility in the arts, in 2019 she was selected to become the first Canadian Ambassador for the Open Medicine Foundation, a global organization whose other representatives include international bestselling authors and Nobel laureates.

Robin Hahn's headshot. Against a dark background, a white femme person with brown hair and eyes smiles up at the viewer. Robin has tan skin and berry-coloured lipstick, and is wearing a white sweater and a delicate gold necklace.

Image description: Headshot of Robin Hahn, a white femme disabled human with brown hair and eyes, wearing a white sweater, berry coloured lipstick and a big smile.

Robin Hahn

Associate Director of Artistic Planning

Robin Hahn (she/they) is a Metropolitan Opera Award-winning lyric soprano, stage director, music educator and content creator whose career has taken her around the world, from Amsterdam to New York to Disneyland. As a performer she has been hailed as “sublime, with a beautiful resonant soprano full of colour” (Opera Canada), and her highlights range from a production of Così fan tutte in the Netherlands, to a Canada-wide tour as soloist with the Chinese Radio Broadcasting Orchestra. As a stage director, Robin’s productions have been hailed as “a masterpiece of controlled mayhem” (Review Vancouver), and her work is known for reinterpreting and updating heteronormative stories. Since co-founding Opera Mariposa, she has become a respected disability advocate within the operatic community, and she is represented by Kello Inclusive, an agency dedicated to representing disabled and visibly different talent. She is also a fast-growing YouTuber whose channel Robin Hahn, sopran has been awarded the Industry Catalyst Grant from Creative BC and the City of Vancouver.

Stephanie Ko's headshot. Against a cream background, a Chinese Canadian woman smiles at the viewer. Stephanie Ko is wearing a wine red dress, a golden chain necklace and winged black eyeliner, and her black hair falls in loose curls around her face.

Image description: Headshot of Stephanie, a disabled Chinese-Canadian woman with wavy black hair wearing a red dress and gold necklace, turning towards the viewer smiling.

Stephanie Ko

General Manager

Stephanie Ko is a disabled arts administrator, designer, consultant and national award-winning writer, as well as the general manager of Opera Mariposa. Having spent over 15 years at the intersection of advocacy and the performing arts, she currently sits on Actsafe’s Performing Arts Standing Committee; serves on the Community Council for the Greater Vancouver Professional Theatre Alliance; organizes with Vancouver’s annual Clean Air Festival; and co-moderates I Lost My Gig Canada, supporting artists and freelance workers impacted by the ongoing pandemic. As a costume designer, Stephanie’s award-winning garments have appeared on stages across North America. As a graphic designer, photographer and photo retoucher, her work has been published in outlets like the Vancouver Sun, Opera Canada and on the cover of Opera America Magazine. Stephanie regularly consults on accessibility and the arts, and brings her lived experience of post-viral chronic illness to collaborations with a range of non-profits and community initiatives. In 2022 she received a Lifetime Honorary Membership from the ME | FM Society of BC in recognition of outstanding service to the chronic illness community. 

Katie Gillespie's headshot. A dramatically lit white woman with curly brown hair smiles into the camera. She is wearing brown glasses and a purple top.

Image description: Headshot of Katie Gillespie, a disabled white woman with long curly brown hair, hazel eyes and glasses, in front of a staircase with a smile on her face.

Katie Gillespie

Communications Associate

Katie Gillespie (she/her/hers) is a disabled recovering grad student, with a background in communications and a passion for all community-engaged arts. Over the last decade, she has volunteered with West Coast companies like the North Shore Light Opera Society, Heroic Opera, East Van Opera, Metro Theatre and United Players of Vancouver, in greater and lesser capacities as her health and her access needs dictate. In roles ranging from board member to box office, from communications associate to an advocate for COVID-19 safety, her focus and passion has always been making theatre more accessible, whether that’s promoting it to younger people, or making it more affordable or more physically and immunologically inclusive. Katie has been a part of the Opera Mariposa team since 2014, and despite worsening health, is excited and committed to contributing what she can to an arts organization explicitly dedicated to promoting disability access in opera and theatre.

Christie Pollock's headshot. A white woman with a brown fringe and large light grey eyes smiles into the camera. She is wearing red lipstick and a small crystal nose stud, along with a white top with a navy blue sweater, and is standing in front of a stone wall.

Image description: Headshot of Christie A. Pollock, a disabled white woman with grey eyes, bangs, and long brown hair tied back, standing before a stone wall. She wears bright burgundy lipstick, a white top, and a deep purple cardigan.

Christie A. Pollock

Communications Associate​

Christie A. Pollock (she/her) has been reorganizing the costume collection, welcoming audience members at the box office, and consulting on the creation of prop songbirds for Opera Mariposa since 2014, in addition to her primary role writing and editing copy. She has also enjoyed volunteering with other performing arts companies in Vancouver including Heroic Opera and East Van Opera. A lifelong choral singer with a linguistics degree and multiple disabilities, much of her time outside of the indie opera world is devoted to patient-centred health care initiatives. Christie collaborates frequently with BC Mental Health & Substance Use Services and the Patient Voices Network, in roles such as panel speaking, reviewing provincial policy, and co-designing hospital procedure. She is also a facilitator for a peer support group with the BPD Society of BC, and a psychology major at Simon Fraser University in a second degree program.