Ottawa, March 8, 2005 -- The Canada Council for the Arts today announced the names of the eight winners of the sixth annual Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts. Carl Beam, Lynne Cohen, Roland Poulin, Françoise Sullivan, Paul Wong, and the partnership of Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak will receive awards for artistic achievement, while curator and visual art promoter Claude Gosselin will receive the outstanding contribution award. The laureates will be presented with their awards by Her Excellency the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, Governor General of Canada, at a ceremony at Rideau Hall on Wednesday, March 16 at 6 p.m. Canada Council Chair Karen Kain will also speak at the ceremony. "These exceptional individuals have matched their extraordinary talent and artistic vision with the perseverance necessary to succeed as artists in a country as vast and diverse as Canada," said the Governor General. "Working in many disciplines and with a variety of media, they have created impressive bodies of work that help define who we are as Canadians and what we stand for as a society." The winners of the Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts were chosen by an independent peer jury of visual and media artists and arts professionals from across Canada. In selecting the 2005 laureates, the jury made the following statement: "Eight remarkable Canadians are being honoured with the prestigious Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts this year ¿ not only for having enriched Canadian arts and culture, but also for having been innovators and pathfinders in their artistic and curatorial practices. In doing so, they all have brought fresh insights to their respective disciplines and to contemporary art, at times disturbing convention and accepted ideas. They have taken us beyond appearances, and renewed and reinvigorated art in the process. The jury's decision was extremely difficult as many more than eight nominees were deserving of this award. The many excellent nominations submitted have reminded us forcefully of the rich and diverse history of Canada's visual and media arts over the past 50 years. The seven artists and one curator chosen are an important part of that history. They have been selected for the uniqueness and sustained creativity of their work, their ability to reach out beyond traditional confines, and their many contributions as leaders and mentors in the visual and media arts over many years. Artist Carl Beam, photographer Lynne Cohen, sculptor Roland Poulin, painter, sculptor and dancer Françoise Sullivan, video artists Lisa Steele, Kim Tomczak and Paul Wong, and curator Claude Gosselin have imprinted strong visions into the fabric of our cultural life. All are worthy recipients of the country's highest distinction in the visual and media arts." The annual awards, funded and administered by the Canada Council for the Arts, were created in June 1999 and presented for the first time in March 2000. The awards recognize distinguished career achievement in the visual and media arts by Canadian artists, as well as outstanding contributions to the visual and media arts through voluntarism, philanthropy, board governance, community outreach or professional activities. In addition to a $15,000 prize, each laureate will be presented with an original artwork created by ceramic artist Maurice Savoie, winner of the 2004 Saidye Bronfman Award for Excellence in the Fine Crafts. Follow this link for Images of the artists, their works and essays. An interactive Flash version of the winners' web site is also available (requires Flash plug-in). Biographical Notes Carl Beam was born in M'Chigeeng (West Bay) on Manitoulin Island. Of Ojibway heritage, the artist has exerted a strong influence on a whole generation of Aboriginal artists and has been instrumental in the development of the art of Canada's First Nations. He has a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Victoria and also did post-graduate work at the University of Alberta. His work, executed in diverse media such as drawing, watercolour, etching, non-silver photography, photo transfer, installation and ceramics, has been exhibited throughout North America as well as in Italy, Denmark, Germany and China. It is found in major Canadian and international collections including the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Vancouver Art Gallery and the Albright-Knox Gallery in Buffalo, N.Y. In 2000, Carl Beam was inducted into the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. He lives in M'Chigeeng. Lynne Cohen is one of the most important artists working today in photography. She studied at the Slade School of Art in London, the Ox-Bow Summer School of Painting in Michigan and the University of Michigan, and has a B.S. from the University of Wisconsin and an M.A. from Eastern Michigan University. She has been in countless solo and group exhibitions around the world and is represented in 47 public collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, the Australian National Gallery, the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Canada Council Art Bank. Lynne Cohen has taught at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, Ryerson University, the École des Beaux-arts de Bordeaux, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Eastern Michigan University, and the University of Ottawa (1974 to present). Born in Racine, Wisconsin, she lived in Ottawa for many years, and now resides in Montreal. Roland Poulin's career spans more than 40 years. His sculptures and drawings have been exhibited in 26 solo and over 70 group exhibitions across Canada, as well as in Belgium, France, Great Britain, Germany and the U.S. His work is found in many Canadian collections, including those of the Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Nickle Arts Museum in Calgary and the Canada Council Art Bank. Roland Poulin also created several major public commissions. He taught at Laval University in Quebec City and the University of Ottawa, the latter for 15 years. For his body of outstanding work, he has received the prestigious Prix Paul-Émile Borduas (2001), the Prix Ozias-Leduc (1992), the Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award (1996) and the Jean Chalmers Award (1998). Roland Poulin was born in St. Thomas, Ontario and now lives in Sainte-Angèle-de-Monnoir, not far from Montreal. Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak have collaborated in the production of video since 1983. They each have significant solo careers and have played important roles in the development of video in Canada. Their collaborative work as producers and distributors of video has afforded them a unique place in the national and international video milieu. The number of national and international solo and group exhibitions, festivals and curatorial projects the two artists (individually and together) have participated in is staggering. Their work is represented in the collections of the National Gallery of Canada, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, the Contemporary Arts Museum in Houston, the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston and the Städtische Kunstmuseum in Bonn, among many others. It has been documented in over 150 articles and critical essays by senior curators and critics. Born, respectively, in Kansas City, Missouri, and Victoria, B.C., Lisa Steele and Kim Tomczak currently live in Toronto. Françoise Sullivan was born in Montreal, where she received her early training at the École des beaux-arts. She is a unique and multi-faceted artist. Well known at the outset as a dancer and choreographer, it has been her work as a painter, sculptor and photographer that has truly marked her long career. She was part of the Automatistes, the avant-garde movement led by Paul.Émile Borduas, and was a signatory of the group's 1948 manifesto, Refus Global. Since then, her work has been seen continuously in solo and group exhibitions, including retrospectives at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec (1993) and at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (2003). She has received the Prix Paul-Émile Borduas (1987) and holds honorary degrees from the Université du Québec à Montréal and York University in Toronto. Françoise Sullivan has taught at Concordia University since 1977, remains in demand as a jury member and lecturer, and is a board member of the Montreal Arts Council. She lives in Montreal. Paul Wong's video career spans some 30 years. His work has been shown in exhibitions and festivals around the world, including London, Paris and Hong Kong. He has had extensive screenings at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 1995-96, the National Gallery of Canada mounted the solo exhibition, On Becoming a Man. In 2003, Hungry Ghosts was presented in the Extra 50 Section of the Venice Biennale. In addition to video production, Paul Wong was instrumental in the founding of two artist-run centres in Vancouver: Satellite Video Exchange (Video-In) in 1973 and On Edge in 1985. In recognition of his contributions to the video and media arts, Paul Wong received the Bell Canada Award in Video Art in 1992 and the CHUM-NFB Expression Award celebrating diversity in the arts in 2003. His work is included in major national and international collections, including the National Gallery of Canada and MoMA in New York. Born in Prince Rupert, B.C., he now lives in Vancouver. Curator and promoter Claude Gosselin has been active in the field of contemporary art for 35 years, having held the positions of visual arts officer at the Canada Council (1975-79) and curator at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal (1979-83). In 1983 he founded the Centre international d'art contemporain de Montréal (CIAC) and, as executive director and artistic director, initiated the ground-breaking exhibition series, Cent jours d'art contemporain de Montréal (1985-96), which brought practices such as installation art and new media by Canadian and international artists into the forefront of contemporary art in Canada. In 1998, he launched the Biennale de Montréal, adding a Canadian city to the important network of international biennials. Both have helped put Canadian art on the international map and have promoted contemporary art to the general public. In 1999, Claude Gosselin received the Prix Carrière from the Société des musées québécois. Born in Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, Quebec, he currently lives in Montreal. Selection of laureates To be nominated for one of the six artistic awards, candidates must have created an outstanding body of work and have made a significant contribution to the development of the visual or media arts over a significant period of time. Professional artists are eligible for nominations in the following four categories: fine arts (painting and drawing, photography and print-making, and sculpture, including installation and other three-dimensional work); applied arts (architecture and fine crafts); independent film and video; and audio and new media. The members of this year's jury were artists Michel Goulet (Montreal), Jeannie Mah (Regina), Milly Ristvedt, (Tamworth,ON) and Laura Wee Lay Laq (Chiliwack, BC), as well as curator Su Ditta (Peterborough, ON), Michel Perron, executive director of the Société des musées québécois (Montreal) and Jeffrey Spalding, director of the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (Halifax). Awards ceremony - March 16The Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, Governor General of Canada will present the awards on Wednesday, March 16 at 6 p.m. in the Ballroom of Rideau Hall (the residence of the Governor General in Ottawa), One Sussex Drive. Media wishing to cover the ceremony should contact Lucie Brosseau in the Press Office at Rideau Hall, (613) 998-7280. Exhibition at the National Gallery of CanadaThe National Gallery of Canada will present an exhibition in celebration of the laureates and their works from March 18 to April 11, 2005. Media representatives are invited to attend the official opening on Thursday, March 17 from 5:30 - 7:30 p.m. in the Great Hall of the National Gallery, 380 Sussex Drive, Ottawa. Journalists wishing to preview the exhibition may do so on Wednesday, March 16 at 10 a.m. Please contact Anouk Hoedeman at (613) 990-6835 or ahoedeman@gallery.ca to RSVP for this media preview. For more information Downloadable images of the artists and selected works are available on the Canada Council web site: http://www.canadacouncil.ca/prizes/ggvma. -30- Media contact: Public Affairs, Research and Communications Donna Balkan, (613) 566-4305 or 1-800-263-5588, ext. 4134 Carole Breton, (613) 566-4414 or 1-800-263-5588, ext. 4523 To arrange interviews with the laureates:Diane Chaperon-LorNational publicist(416) 653-0849E-mail: chaperonlor@sympatico.ca
