Michael Morris, Elizabeth Zvonar and Cate Rimmer have been announced as the recipients of British Columbia’s most prestigious prizes in the visual arts—the Audain Prize, VIVA Award and Alvin Balkind Curator’s Prize, respectively.
Multi-disciplinary artist Michael Morris garnered this year’s Audain Prize, which recognizes a senior artist for their contribution to British Columbia’s arts community. A veteran of the Vancouver art scene, Morris founded the Image Bank, which fostered a mail-art exchange between artists, with Vincent Trasov in 1969, and co-founded Western Front, one of Canada’s oldest interdisciplinary artist-run centres. He was awarded a Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts in 2011.
Elizabeth Zvonar won the 2015 VIVA Award, a prize granted by the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation for the Visual Arts to recognize mid-career artists who demonstrate outstanding achievement. Known for her elliptical, curious sculptures and collages, Zvonar has shown at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, the Morris and Helen Belkin Gallery and Western Front, and was awarded the 2009 Mayor’s Award for Emerging Visual Artist.
Finally, Cate Rimmer has been honoured with the Alvin Balkind Curator’s Prize. A founding director of Artspeak in Vancouver, Rimmer has acted as director of Truck Gallery in Calgary and the curator-in-residence at the Saidye Bronfman Centre in Montreal before taking up her current post as curator of the Charles H. Scott Gallery in Vancouver. In this position, Rimmer has created exhibitions with artists including Matthew Buckingham, Stan Douglas, Bas Jan Ader and more.
The awards will be formally bestowed at a ceremony on April 16 in the Great Hall of the BC Law Courts in a ceremony open to the public.
