THE JOY AWARDS 2013
WINNERS OF
THE HELEN HILL ANIMATED JOY AWARD and
THE TECHNICOLOR POST JOY AWARD 2013.
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The Linda Joy Media Arts Society is pleased to announce the winners of the 2013 Helen Hill Animated Joy Award and the Technicolor Post Joy Award. Selecting from a number of excellent submissions from Atlantic Canadian filmmakers and media artists is a challenging process for the jury. We are pleased to be able to recognize and support these two filmmakers and their projects in the November Joy Awards session.
The Board and staff of the Linda Joy Media Arts Society extend their heartfelt congratulations.
The Awards
(note: Award partner benefits may be cash or services)
The Technicolor Post Joy Award:
Winner: Tim Tracey
For: Canadian Ninja
Feature comedy
Award partner Technicolor ($2,500).
Riffing on genre B movies and comically referencing America’s over-the-top action hero tradition, Tim Tracey brings us a new, all too Canadian hero, Buck North, Canadian Ninja. This comedy feature project offers up fun movie entertainment while playing with issues of Canadian individual and collective identity, meditations on life in the large cultural shadow of the United States, and what the heck is a Canadian movie anyway?
Tim is a well known figure in the local film and media arts community, having taught workshops at King’s College, the Centre For Art Tapes, and Ross Creek Centre for the Arts. His last project, the animated film KREB, winner of a past Helen Hill Animated Joy Award, went on to win Best Animated Short 2013 (AFFA), and garnered the support of a NS Art Grant. His previous animation MAN WITH NOTHING TO LOSE, won the 2005 National ZED TV animation contest 3rd place. FEAST OF FAMINE, a feature documentary, has been shown across Canada and internationally.
The Helen Hill Animated Joy Award:
Winner: Becka Barker
For: The Evolution of Max
Animated documentary
Award partner: Atlantic Filmmakers Coop ($2,500); Centre For Art Tapes ($1,100).
THE EVOLUTION OF MAX is an animated documentary about twelve year old Max Billard, who has been keeping a journal about his life and everyone in it. The journal is revealing, fascinating and intensely personal, filtering the world, friends and family through the lens of Max’s autism. Max’s love of animal and evolutionary biology colours his observations throughout. Recently, Becka Barker, at his family’s invitation, began working with Max to create an animated film based on Max’s journals. This exploration of the world as discovered by Max, highlights the normality of difference and the potential brilliance that resides in us all.
Becka Barker once attended Helen Hill’s Experimental Animation class at the Nova Scotia College of Art & Design (NSCAD) in 1998, and cites Hill as a major inspiration for her own career, so there is a circular appropriateness in her winning the Helen Hill Animated Award. Since that time Becka has taught and mentored media artists at NSCAD, the Centre for Art Tapes, the Atlantic Filmmakers’ Coop and Soonchunhyang University (ROK). Her previous films have screened internationally including her animated film ASSEMBLED. Becka has been a presenter at international conferences speaking on media arts and language.