Bio
Jonathan Derksen spent his formative years in Malaysia, Japan, Canada and Bolivia. After earning a B.A. and B. Ed., he spent several years leading expeditions and teaching in the Bolivia Andes and Indian Himalayas. He later moved with his family to Kelowna, BC, where he taught journalism and filmmaking.
Documentary work with National Geographic and Discovery Channel has taken him from the Andean highlands to the remote Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. In 2016, he filmed “Rescue in the Bolivian Andes” featuring the conservation efforts at La Senda Wildlife Refuge. In 2019, he directed and produced “Return to Old Crow” about the extraordinary Vuntut Gwich’in people of the Yukon Arctic.
Jonathan is also an avid writer and photographer. Publications include a travel memoir about living in India, a hiking guide to the Garhwal Himalaya, two coffee table books on Bolivia, and, most recently, a book of poetry.
He is passionate about adventure storytelling, conserving Andean watershed and wildlife, and the preservation of indigenous cultures. He is currently working on a documentary about the fight to protect Bolivia’s astounding Madidi National Park, considered to be the most biologically diverse ecosystem on earth.
