About

Born in Canada in 1956, Michel Gagnon was invited in April 2014 to assume the post of General Manager and oversee the inaugural phase of the LAC, Lugano’s cultural centre, which opened its doors on September 12, 2015. After earning a degree in Arts Management at the HEC Montréal, the country’s most important business school, as well as a diploma in music from the École de Musique Vincent d’Indy (Université de Sherbrooke), Michel Gagnon was assistant stage manager at the Opéra de Montréal (1980–1990), stage manager for Les Grands Ballets Canadiens (1990–1996), and production head stage manager for the Opéra de Montréal (1996–2000) until the Place des Arts de Montréal appointed him Director of Programming (2000–2014) where he managed a delicate transition period for that major cultural complex: seven theaters, a concert hall, more than 7 thousands seats for over a thousand events produced every year, and which now was seeking a new way to approach a public that had become alienated by elitist and irrelevant programming. Michel Gagnon took up this challenge by putting together an artistic season that explored the themes of the contemporary world through coproductions and artistic residencies. He also developed an important project of cultural mediation to accompany the excellence and international breadth of the programme while involving and winning over Quebec's artistic and social communities. It proved to be a wealth of human and professional experience which he brought with him to the LAC and which has contributed to his success.

Born in Trieste in 1974, after graduating in piano and studying composition and orchestral conducting, he has dedicated himself to practicing the operatic repertoire, working as a preparatory pianist for opera singers and as choirmaster at the Teatro Lirico Sperimentale in Spoleto. On the suggestion of its then General Director Claudio Lepore, during that same period he attended one of the first University master's courses offered in Italy in the field of Entertainment Management at the Alma Mater University of Bologna. At the end of his course of studies, he first focused his interest on the organization of professional training courses for opera singers, associate conductors, and orchestra players, before taking on roles of increasingly greater responsibility at important orchestral institutions  both in Italy and in Austria.
After a short period as Coordinator of the Artistic Direction at the Teatro San Carlo Foundation in Naples, he was offered the position of Head of Musical Services and Annual programming at the Teatro alla Scala Foundation, where he had the opportunity to further develop his own managerial skills under the guidance of its then General Director Maria Di Freda. The exhilarating experiences of the Verdi-Wagner Season and the Milan Expo encouraged him to further broaden the scope of his interests, taking him from the operational management of supporting artistic performers to the creation of complex projects with a wide international scope. In 2016, he accepted the invitation to take up the position of Artistic Coordinator and Tour Manager of the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester, the resident orchestra of the KKL Lucerne Concert Hall. As assistant to the Superintendent of the Numa Bischof Ullmann Orchestra, he received the ideal stimuli to further increase his professionalism in the field of musical programming and to come into contact with the greatest artists on the international music scene.

With a degree in Literature, he graduated from the Scuola dello Stabile in Turin and was assistant director to Luca Ronconi on Progetto Domani, a theatrical event that was part of the 2006 Winter Olympic Games in Turin, as well as on several shows. He has directed dozens of works for the Napoli Teatro Festival, Piccolo Teatro in Milano, INDA Siracusa, Teatro Due in Parma, Ponchielli in Cremona, and Circuito Lirico Lombardo. Since 2014, he has been the artistic director of LuganoInScena, where he has directed The Seagull by Anton Chekhov, Ifigenia, liberata by Rifici-Dematté, Purgatorio by Ariel Dorfman, The Barber of Seville by Rossini, Avevo un bel pallone rosso by Angela Dematté, and I Cenci by Giorgio Battistelli, which was on the bill of the Venice Biennale Musica and the Reggio Emilia Festival Aperto in 2020. In 2019, he directed Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi and Ravel's L'heure espagnole at the Teatro Grande in Brescia. Since 2020, he has been the artistic director of LAC Lugano Arte e Cultura, for which he designed and directed Macbeth, le cose nascoste, which he also co-wrote with Dematté; Le relazioni pericolose, written with Livia Rossi; Verdi’s La traviata directed by Markus Poschner; Processo Galileo, co-directed with Andrea De Rosa; Ulisse Artico, a co-production with the Teatro Biondo in Palermo; Anna Bolena by Gaetano Donizetti directed by Diego Fasolis; and La pulce nell'orecchio, for which he handled the translation, adaptation, and dramaturgy in collaboration with Tindaro Granata. In 2024, he directed De Gasperi: l’Europa brucia, written by Angela Dematté. Since 2015, he has been running the "Luca Ronconi" Theatre School at the Piccolo Teatro in Milan. In 2005, he won the Critics' Award for best up-and-coming director (2005) and in 2009, he received the Eti Olimpici del Teatro Director of the Year Award. He has also won the Critics' Award and the Golden Graal and been nominated for the Ubu Director of the Year Award.  He received the Enriquez Award for the theatrical season of LuganoInScena (2015) and for the direction of Ifigenia, liberata (2017), as well as the “I Numeri Uno” award from the Italian Chamber of Commerce for Switzerland for his work at the LAC (2019). In 2021, he was awarded the title of Master by the Radicondoli Theatre Award, as well as receiving the Hystrio Digital Stage Award and the special Ubu Award for the digital project Lingua Madre. Capsule per il futuro, conceived in collaboration with Paola Tripoli. In 2022, he was among the finalists for the “Ivo Chiesa – Una vita per il teatro” International Award in the "School" category. In September 2024, he was awarded the "Premio Hystrio" for Directing.