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The city and the Windsor Endowment for the Arts handed out $31,500 in funding while celebrating more than 20 artists, arts organizations and supporters during the Windsor Mayor’s Arts Awards.
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Mayor Drew Dilkens and WEA president Stephanie Barnhard co-hosted the event held last week on an outdoor stage in the Vision Corridor alongside the Chimczuk Museum and Art Windsor-Essex.
Each award recipient and presenter had an opportunity to discuss their careers and successes, the projects that brought them recognition and upcoming initiatives.
There were three recipients of the 2022 Windsor Mayor’s Arts Awards.
Kaitlyn Karns received $1,000 in the Individual Artist category. Waawiiyaatanong Feminist Theater (WFT) received $1,000 for Arts Organization, and Arts Volunteer winner Pam Rodzik received $500.
The Windsor Endowment for the Arts provided grants in categories including Emerging Artist, Arts Infrastructure and Youth Grant categories. There was also a WEA Leadership Award,
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The WEA gave out five leadership awards. Clara Howitt, superintendent of education for the Greater Essex County District School Board, received the Community Arts Leadership Award. Sarah Jarvis, president of Literary Arts Windsor and organizer of BookFest Windsor, as well as a podcaster on All Write in Sin City took home the Literary Arts Leadership Award.
Tom Lucier and his Phog Lounge received the Performing Arts Leadership in Music Award. Michael K. Potter, managing director of Post Productions and co-owner of The Shadowbox Theatre, received the Performing Arts Leadership in Theater Award.
Carl Lavoy, an educator, mentor and retired director and curator of the Thames Art Gallery, received the Visual Arts Leadership Award.
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For the first time, the event included an In Memoriam presentation honoring arts community members who died over the last two years.
Eighteen people were honored including Helen Turner Brown, founding member of the Artists of Color and first secretary on the board of the North American Black Historical Museum, now the Amherstburg Freedom Museum; Evelyn Gray McLean, former dean of women at the University of Windsor and the city’s first heritage planner, as well as founder of The Friends of the Court (Mackenzie Hall), and a founder of Les Amis Duff-Bâby; and Rosalie Trombley, music director of The Big 8 CKLW, famously known as “the Girl with the Golden Ear.”
For more information about the awards and recipients, go to wea-arts.com or citywindsor.ca.