LAWRENCE SHAPIRO (he, him)
Lawrence Shapiro is Canada’s leading amputee dancer. A pioneering disability movement artist for over twenty years, Lawrence is a validated Deaf and Disability Artist through the Canada Council for the Arts and the author of the ground breaking volume The Physically Disabled Dancer and the Affirmative Model of Disability published by Routledge Press in 2025. This unprecedented examination of contemporary disability arts consists of interviews with physically disabled dancers, choreographers, academics who study disability dance and arts producers who stage work of disabled dancers as well as Lawrence’s own essays into the current achievement and challenges of the physically disabled dancer. It is the first book ever written by a physically disabled dancer on the subject of physically disabled dancers.
Lawrence is the first Canadian disabled dancer to perform in Germany (2022), the first Canadian disabled dancer to perform in New Zealand (2023) and the first Canadian disabled dancer to perform in Cambodia (2025). Lawrence has had a long association with Amici Dance Theatre in the UK and was privileged to perform with their company in London in 2018. 2021 saw the premiere of “Neither Starved Nor Cold” at the Gibney Dance Centre in New York City with Heidi Latsky Dance in which Lawrence both produced and performed this ground breaking stage work which explored the choreographic landscape of the dancer with limb loss.
Lawrence is a multi-grant recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council and the Ontario Arts Council’s Deaf and Disability Arts Projects program. Published widely in the field of dance and disability arts, his writings can be found in leading publications in this field including Choreographic Practices, Canadian Scholars Press and The Dance Current.
Lawrence is passionate about elevating the amputee performer in contemporary dance and seeks to connect with like-minded dance professionals.