Arts community ready to celebrate at 2017 City of Hamilton Arts Awards

HAMILTON, ON - May 25, 2017 - A record 115 nominees will be recognized at this year’s City of Hamilton Arts Awards celebration event on Wednesday, June 7 at the Hamilton Central Library’s Circuit 4.0 Collaborative Creative Space, 55 York Blvd as part of Hamilton Arts Week.

The evening starts at 5:30 pm with a reception featuring performances and art installations that make use of the sound and digital equipment available at the Circuit 4.0 Collaborative Creative Space. The awards ceremony, honouring local artists and their achievements, will start at 7 pm with film screenings and live music.

This year’s tribute to Hamilton’s thriving artistic community will be emceed by Jody Boston and Dejehan Hamilton and include art installations and performances from:

• CQ
• Steve Mazza
• Persons

• Group of 7 Billion and Jay Perry
• iloks / swell
• Steel Express

• MELD (Polinator Films Inc.)
• FREE SPACE (Matthew MacFadzean)
• Emay

Tickets

The City of Hamilton Arts Awards event is free to attend, but tickets are limited and will be available first to those on our Waiting List. E-mail [email protected] with your name and the number of tickets requested to add your name to the list.

The Awards

The Arts Awards program will present $36,500 in cash awards to artists in eleven categories ranging from Music to Visual Arts to Lifetime Achievement. A unique focus of the Arts Award program is recognition of the community’s established and emerging artists. As part of their nomination, each established artist selects an emerging artist who they mentor and whose work they wish to promote. Each Established Artist recipient receives a cash award of $2,500 and a bronze medallion crafted by Canadian sculptor Dora de Pédery-Hunt. Each Emerging Artist recipient receives a certificate and a $1,000 cash award. 

Lifetime Achievement
Award recognizes the long-standing and significant achievements of artists and arts managers over the course of an entire career.

Arts Innovation
Award recognizes an arts leader who currently demonstrates exemplary vision, innovation, creativity, and excellence in their field. This person has expanded the impact and fostered the growth of Hamilton’s arts sector. Professional artists and arts managers can be nominated for this award.

Arts Education and Community Arts Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor - Marz Homes
Award recognizes professionals providing arts activities in schools or to the community for participants of any age.

Arts Management Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor - Beckett Lowden Read Chartered Accountants
Award recognizes arts professional who demonstrate leadership in an arts organization or project. Includes arts programmers, curators, marketing and communications specialists, fundraising and development staff and facility managers.

Dance and Performing Arts Award
Award recognizes dancers and choreographers, storytellers, spoken word artists, circus artists and stand-up comedians.

Fine Craft Award
Award recognizes functional and non-functional craft-based artists whose work can include beadwork, book arts, ceramics, textile, fashion and wearable art, furniture, glass, jewellery, metal and wood.

Media Arts Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor - Core Urban Inc.
Award recognizes creators of film, video, audio/sound art, graphic design, animation, digital art, web-based art, media art installation, photography and new media.

Music Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor - Mohawk College
Award recognizes performers, composers, songwriters and technical producers in all genres of music.

Theatre Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor -The Incite Foundation for the Arts
Award recognizes actors, directors, playwrights, lighting designers, sound designers and costume designers.

Visual Arts Award
Emerging Artist Award Sponsor - Upper James Toyota
Award recognizes painters, sculptors, drawers, printmakers, photographers, performance and installation artists.

Writing Award
Award recognizes poets, short story writers, journalists, fiction and non-fiction writers and publishers.

Local businesses supporting the arts

The 2017 City of Hamilton Arts Awards would not be possible without the support of local businesses. The City of Hamilton is pleased to recognize the sponsors of the 2017 Arts Awards:

Emerging Artist Award Sponsors
Beckett Lowden Read Chartered Accountants, Core Urban Inc., Marz Homes, Mohawk College, The Incite Foundation for the Arts and Upper James Toyota.

Event sponsors
Banko Media returns for the second year as Photography Sponsor, long-time supporter The Hamilton Spectator as Media Sponsor, the Venue sponsor is the Hamilton Public Library. The catered reception that kicks off the event is sponsored by dpai architecture Inc., Arcelor Mittal Dofasco, Collective Arts Brewing, and VIEW Magazine

Additional Information & Resources

• The 2017 Arts Awards Program is managed by the City of Hamilton in collaboration with Cobalt Connects, a non-profit arts service organization that connects artists to creative opportunities and spaces
• First presented in 1976, the Hamilton Arts Awards continues to recognize the vital contributions of the city’s arts sector and to celebrate the exceptional achievements of individual artists and arts managers

Visit www.hamilton.ca/artsawards for all the latest updates about this year's nominees and event.  Follow us on social media using #HAA2017

City of Hamilton Arts Awards

@HamArtsAwards

HamArtsAwards

For additional information and high resolution photos of this year’s artists and performers, please email [email protected] or call 905-546-2424 ext. 6281.

For more information about Hamilton Central Library’s The Circuit 4.0 Collaborative Creative Space, visit www.hpl.ca/circuit, for Hamilton Arts Week, taking place June 3 to 9, visit www.hamiltonartscouncil.ca/artsweek.