Media Release
For immediate
release
August 7, 2006
Takao Tanabe, Blast Theory among Banff Centre’s 2006 Fleck Fellowship winners
Renowned Vancouver-based painter Takao Tanabe and a trio of new media artists from Britain who call themselves Blast Theory are among the ten artists chosen by The Banff Centre to receive its prestigious Paul D. Fleck Fellowships in the Arts for 2006. In an unusual twist to the Fleck Fellowships, both Tanabe and Blast Theory will be at The Banff Centre this month to share their work with the public through the Banff Summer Arts Festival. A retrospective exhibition of Tanabe’s works from the Banff Centre Collection opens August 10 and Blast Theory presents its GPS-facilitated hide-and-seek game Can you see me now? on August 11.
The Fleck Fellowships offer artists the opportunity to create new work in the inspiring setting of The Banff Centre by providing them with studios and support for up to a month’s residency. In 2006, an international cross-section of senior artists in all artistic disciplines have been chosen to take advantage of the gift of time and space provided by Fleck Fellowships. Some of them will also be presenting their work to the public while in Banff, while others’ work will be seen in venues ranging from the Canada Dance Festival to the Boston Symphony hall.
“The opportunity to really focus on a project through a Fleck Fellowship is invaluable, especially when an artist’s work is in high demand,” says Sarah Iley, The Banff Centre’s vice-president of Programming. “We know, for instance, that composer Osvaldo Golijov has four commissions with their due dates looming, while writer Alex Ross, who is the music critic for The New Yorker, has a book to finish. To be here, with no distractions, will enable them to create the kind of work they will be proud of. Certainly Patricia O’Callaghan, Sandra Laronde, and Wen Wei Wang have created memorable pieces while in residence this summer as Fleck Fellows.”
The Paul D. Fleck Fellowship Trust was established by the Fleck Family in 2001 in memory of Paul D. Fleck, former president of The Banff Centre. The Trust allows for ten Fellowships to be awarded to senior artists, from Canada and abroad every year. Eligible artists may be working in the fields of Aboriginal arts, media and visual arts, music and sound, theatre arts, or writing and publishing. Fleck Fellows are nominated, then chosen based on past accomplishments and potential for artistic achievement during their residencies.
Recipients of the 2006 Paul D. Fleck Fellowships in the Arts
- Alex Ross, writer, U.S.
- Jim Perrin, writer, U.K.
- Osvaldo Golijov, composer, U.S.
- Blast Theory (Matt Adams, Ju Row Farr, Nick Tandavanitj), new media artists, U.K.
- Sandra Laronde, choreographer, Canada
- Wen Wei Wang, choreographer, Canada
- Patricia O’Callaghan, singer, Canada
- Kathy Kissik, visual artist, U.S.
- Takao Tanabe, visual artist, Canada