Issa Manalo LOPEZ is a Manila-based independent theatremaker, director and instructor at the University of the Philippines, Diliman. Her creative works and practice-based research examines women’s narratives on female identity and social history. She directed, “KAPIT: a documentary theatre performance on the survivors of Super typhoon Yolanda”, which she devised with Filipino collaborators to surface stories of resilience and cooperation. As a featured director in the Asian Performing Arts Farm Exhibition 2019 in Tokyo, Japan she collaborated with Asian artists in devising “ASIA/N/ESS/ES”, a work that interrogates the multiplicity of “how asia views Asia”.

Currently, she is the Artistic Director of Dulaang Unibersidad ng Pilipinas in UP Diliman.