Lifetime Achievement Award
Hamilton’s Tom Wilson honoured with lifetime achievement award
Wilson’s award was one of 16, including nine ‘creator awards’ in a variety of disciplines and four ‘arts champion awards’ announced during Hamilton Arts Week.
Author, musician and painter Tom Wilson is the 2021 City of Hamilton Arts Awards lifetime achievement honoree for his work over the years as an author, musician and painter.
Wilson’s award was one of 16, including nine “creator awards” in a variety of disciplines and four “arts champion awards,” announced in a series of online webcasts during Hamilton Arts Week, June 3 to June 12.
Wilson, best known for his work as a singer-songwriter fronting rock groups such as Junkhouse, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings and Lee Harvey Osmond, is a five-time Juno Award winner.
In recent years, Wilson has also branched out into visual arts, with his brightly coloured paintings displayed in galleries in New York, Toronto and Vancouver. Wilson is also author of the bestselling memoir “Beautiful Scars.”
Creator Award winners
Jordi Alfaro — Born in Spain and now based in Hamilton, Alfaro is known for his ceramic sculptures.
Karen Ancheta — An actor by training and a storyteller with Hamilton 7, Ancheta is also co-founder of Porch Light Theatre Hamilton and The Garden Project.
Olivia Brouwer — A mixed media painter, printmaker, and sculptor, Brouwer translates her own partial blindness into art that raises awareness around visual impairment and accessibility.
Daniel Edmonds — A musician and visual artist, Edmonds’ work involves composition, production and illustration. He is also a former member of the band Harlan Pepper.
Jennifer Gillies — A writer, editor and teacher, Gillies is the artistic director of the annual gritLit literary festival.
Andrew McPhail — Co-founder of Hamilton’s Hundred Dollar Gallery, on, McPhail’s work uses materials such as Band-Aids, Kleenex, pins, sequins and Post-its in his sculptures and installations.
Leon ‘Eklipz’ Robinson — A multi-dimensional artist, Robinson has been a leader in Hamilton hip hop culture for decades.
Jim Ruxton — Winner of two Dora Mavor Moore Awards, Ruxton works in film, installation, theatre and dance, fusing technology with art.
Stylo Starr — Working in both digital and hand-cut paper collage, Starr’s art is a meditation on Black culture, life and fantasy.
Arts Champion Awards
Erica Commisso — A volunteer with 93.3 CFMU since 2018 as both music director and on-air host, Commisso is also a member of VIE Division, a semi-professional hip-hop dance team based out of McMaster.
Bradlee Henry — Henry has been a driving force in helping Hamilton’s Indigenous youth reconnect with their community through his vibrant traditional drumming and singing.
Judy Marsales — A prominent local business owner, Marsales has been an avid promoter of Hamilton arts and culture for many years. r, both as a business owner and an active volunteer. Marsales has served as a board member for the Brott Music Festival, Hamilton All Star Jazz Band, Hamilton Music Collective (An Instrument for Every Child), and the Hamilton Music Advisory Team.
Nancy McKibbin Gray — A founding board member and volunteer of the Carnegie Gallery, McKibbin Gray has served on many committees including the Arts Advisory Commission, Telling Tales, gritLit, and Arts Dundas Weekend. She was also a long-time employee of Bryan Prince Bookseller.
Shirley Elford Emerging Arts Commission Prizes
Fareh Malik — Formerly a spoken-word poet, Malik’s work has been included in several anthologies and is the first-place recipient of the MH Canada 2020 Poetry Contest.
Dylan Vandemaele — Discovering his passion for performance, at Glendale Secondary School, Vandemaele has gone on to work with Theatre Aquarius, The Frostbites Festival and Defining Movement Dance.
Lifetime achievement and creator award winners each received a $2,500 cash award, plus a bronze medallion. Arts champion award recipients received a recognition piece designed by artist David Trautrimas. Shirley Elford emerging artist prize winners each received $2,000 toward creating an artistic work for the 2022 event.
In other awards’ news, former Hamilton residents Daniel Lanois and Kathleen Edwards each made the long list for the $50,000 2021 Polaris Prize for best Canadian album of the year. Lanois, best known for his Grammy winning work as producer of musical artists such as U2, Bob Dylan and Peter Gabriel, made the list for his latest solo album, “Heavy Sun.” Edwards, a singer-songwriter now living near Ottawa, was nominated for “Total Freedom,” her first album in several years. The long-list of Polaris candidates will be narrowed down to a short-list of 10 on July 15, with the winner announced this fall.
Also making the Polaris long list was Hamilton-based electronic artist Daniel Monkman, who recorded his album “Bleached Wavves” under the stage name Zoon. Monkman’s music blends his Ojibwe roots with alternative rock.
By: Special to The Spectator Tue., June 15, 2021