Sixth Anniversary Announcement - The 2001 K.M. Hunter Artists Awards

Sixth anniversary announcement 
The 2001 K.M. Hunter Artists Awards
 “Supporting the emerging artist.”

Toronto - Tuesday, March 20, 2001 — The K.M. Hunter Charitable Foundation is proud to announce the winners of The Sixth Annual K.M. Hunter Artists Awards.

DANCE: Marie-Josée Chartier
LITERATURE: Dennis Bock
MUSIC:  Phil Dwyer
THEATRE Co-winners: Peter Reitzel & Julie Reitzel (The Canadia dell’Arte) 
VISUAL ARTS Co-winners:  Lois Andison & Janet Morton

Now in its sixth year, The K.M. Hunter Artists Awards are five awards of $8,000 each for artists living in Ontario in each of the fields of: dance, literature, music, theatre and visual arts.

Established in 1996, The K.M. Hunter Artists Awards have been annually awarded to artists who have completed their professional training and have begun to establish themselves and make an impact in their chosen field.

“It is our intention that the awards be given to people who have demonstrated both talent and the potential for further development. Imagination, originality and the determination to achieve should be taken into consideration. We are not concerned so much to pick future stars as to reward and encourage people whom we believe will go on to do good work.” - Martin Hunter

The K.M. Hunter Charitable Foundation is named after the late Kenneth Martin Hunter, a Toronto businessman who was the major shareholder in the Buntin Reid Paper Company Limited, as a means of contributing to the welfare of the community in which he had lived and worked for the majority of his life. This foundation is well-known for its regular and generous grants, donations and awards primarily in the areas of medical research and social welfare. Since the Foundation’s inception in 1966, approximately $6 million has been given out in grants, donations and awards.

Martin Hunter, the son of Kenneth Martin Hunter and a theatrical director keenly interested in the arts, established The K.M. Hunter Artists Awards as a way to support younger artists at a critical point in their development.

“The awards were inspired by an award I received in my early thirties that helped me to realise I should take myself seriously as an artist and keep on trying to perfect my craft. Unlike many awards that are for the well established artist, these awards are intended to give younger artists the recognition and encouragement to continue with their work.” - Martin Hunter

The K.M. Hunter Artists Awards are administered by the Ontario Arts Council Foundation, a public charitable foundation that encourages and facilitates private giving to the arts. Winners are selected by juries of experienced artists from applicants recommended by Ontario Arts Council juries. 

BIOS & UP-COMING EVENTS FOR the 2001  winners 
K.M. HUNTER ARTISTS AWARDS 

DANCE
Winner: Marie-Josée Chartier 

Born in Montreal, now living in Toronto, Marie-Josée Chartier is a dancer, choreographer, vocalist and teacher. For the past 20 years she has been performing professionally throughout Canada, the U.S., and Europe.

In 1988, Marie-Josée Chartier began to work on choreography. Her work has received critical acclaim at numerous festivals throughout Canada and Europe. She received Toronto’s Dora Mavor Moore Award nomination for Outstanding New Choreography. Her work was the subject of a 30 minute documentary film ‘In Stillness and In Motion” aired on national television (CBC, Bravo! And Radio-Québec) and in the Montreal’s Festival de Films sur l’Art.

Four new commissioned choreographed works:

Vestige, a work for 8 dancers for the Toronto Dance Theatre, quicksilver, for solo artist Yvonne Ng (Toronto and Singapore), Cicatrice, for Springboard Dance (Calgary) and Déclenchement for the School of Dance (Ottawa).

She also created her own solo work (both choreography and music) Vue sur l’Infini which she performed in Toronto, Edmonton, Vancouver, Regina, and in Montreal, March 2000.

Her 1997 work Variations on Figures for the AGO in Toronto was remounted for 5 dancers in Regina and presented at the MacKenzie Art Gallery along with the premiere of Mata Hari Terbenam, a new solo for Chartier choreographed by Peter Chin.

Coming Up:

• performing for Montreal choreographer Louise Bédard Danse in Urbania Box - Western tour

• new solo works created by Julia Aplin and Allen Kaeja

• the choreographing of a new opera produced by the Queen of Puddings

• newest work: Etude Pour Deux Mammifers (Mammalian Study) has its Toronto premiere April 19^th - 21st at the DuMaurier Theatre presented by DanceWorks and commissioned Allen and Karen Kaeja

LITERATURE
Winner: Dennis Bock

Dennis Bock was born in Belleville, Ontario and grew up in Oakville. He graduated with an Honours B.A. in English and Philosophy from Western University.

For five years he lived in Madrid, Spain teaching English and working on his writing. In 1994 Dennis returned to Toronto where he now lives.

His first book of short stories, Olympia, was published in 1998 by Double Day Canada and by Bloomsbury in England and the U.S. For this book he won the Canadian Author’s Association Jubilee Prize for best collection of stories, the Danuta Gleed Prize for Best First Book of Stories, and England’s Betty Trask Prize for Best Book written by an author under 35 (England & the Commonwealth). It was also nominated for a Toronto Book Award and for Ireland’s IMPAC Award.

He is currently a contributing book reviewer for the Globe & Mail’s Book Section.

Coming Up:

Dennis Bock’s new book “The Ash Garden’ will be published by Harper Flamingo and is due out September 2001 in the U.S., Britain, Germany and Canada.

MUSIC
Winner: Phil Dwyer

Phil Dwyer grew up in British Columbia and was first exposed to music through his father’s extensive record collection. The music of Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie and Ella Fitzgerald was heard on a regular basis at the Dwyer household. Phil began by playing piano, and gravitated to the alto sax at around age ten. By fifteen, he was already hard at work on his characteristic full and soulful tenor sound.

Just after high school, Phil was the recipient of a Canada Council Grant to study in New York City with noted player and teacher, Dave Leibman. Much to Leibman’s consternation, Phil gravitated to the mind-bending, experimental playing of modern saxophone giant, Steve Grossman. He studied extensively with Grossman, and eventually performed in New York City in a number of  all-star combinations…including gigs with Grossman, Kenny Barron, Buster Williams and Lenny White.  

In 1987, he relocated to Toronto and began a professional career that has involved all aspects of the music business - from music education (he has been on the faculty of York University since 1989) to composition, recording and live performance. Phil has received numerous performance awards, and has been nominated five times for the prestigious Juno Award. He has won a Best Jazz Album Juno twice for his 1989 recording Looking Up with Hugh Fraser. and for his 1993 CD offering, Fables and Dreams with the Dave Young/Phil Dwyer Quartet.  

Whether it’s performing original piano works as a solo artist with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, playing burning be-bop in the funkiest jazz “boite” or inspiring young musicians as a jazz educator, he simply does it all, and does it with dedication and skill.

Coming Up:

• Touring  with Ingrid Jenson - end of April to the beginning of May

• May 15 - 19 performs at the Senator in Toronto with Ingrid Jenson

THEATRE
Co-winners: Peter Reitzel & Julie Reitzel  (The Canadia dell’Arte)  

Peter Reitzel is a graduate of the George Brown Theatre School. His wife and partner Julie Reitzel graduated from the University of Windsor with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting.

Together they run the acclaimed Canadia dell’Arte Theatre in Toronto, a non-profit professional theater company that produces original works.

Over the past five years in the Toronto area, they have independently mounted and performed both original and classic work in a ‘season’ format. In addition they perform annually at the Toronto Fringe Festival. Along with members Michael Chipman and Dennis Frey, Peter and Julie Reitzel have worked collectively for more than seven years and performed more than a dozen shows in cities across Canada.

In 1999 The Canadia dell’Arte received three Dora Mavor Moor Award nominations in the independent theatre category.

Coming Up:
They are currently in rehearsal for their new shows:

• ‘How Is It That You Want to Live?’ opening at The Canadia dell’Arte Theatre — 186 Munro St. -  April 12^th through May 6^th  

• Sonic Lab 4.0, a night of music as theatre, runs May 10^th  through 13^th.

VISUAL ARTS:  
Co-Winner: Lois Andison

Born in Smith Falls Ontario, Lois Andison now lives in Toronto. She graduated with high honours from Sheridan College’s Interpretive Illustration Programme and has a BFA from York University, Faculty of Fine Arts (graduated first class with distinction).

She has had solo exhibitions at numerous galleries across North America including:
The Red Head Gallery, Toronto
Visual Arts Burnaby, B.C.
The Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge Alberta
Niagara Artists’ Company, St. Catharines, Ont.
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco, Mexico City
La Centrale, Montreal

Coming Up:  

She is currently working on:

• a solo show for the Koffler Gallery opening November 2001

• a piece for The Tree Museum in Gravenhurst, Ont. for September 2001

   
Co-Winner: Janet Morton

Janet Morton makes her home on Ward’s Island in Toronto. She graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts Specialized Honours from York University in 1990.

Since then she has had numerous exhibitions of her textile based installations at such galleries as:
The Paul Petro Gallery, Toronto
The Canadian Museum for Textiles, Toronto
Mercer Union Gallery
Modern Fuel Museum. Kingston
The Works Festival, Edmonton
Harbourfront, Toronto
The Art Gallery of Windsor, Windsor
Mount Saint Vincent University Gallery, Halifax
The Power Plant, Toronto

Coming Up:  

She recently won a Canada Council Paris Studio Award and is currently in Paris. She has a solo show coming up at The Paul Petro Gallery, Toronto in October 2001