An Update from the Arts Awards Waterloo Region Board
The pandemic is having a significant impact on the arts community. At the same time, in the midst of a pandemic, art in all its forms is becoming increasingly important to the public, providing joy, beauty, comfort, and respite from our day to day lives. Given this, we believe it is an extremely important year to honour and recognize local arts.
Arts Awards Waterloo Region continues without disruption
We’re aware that some awards organizations have made changes to their awarding processes or calendar year due to the pandemic. We have not. AAWR processes continue without disruption:
- In 2020, our nominations period, voting and awards event proceeded
- In 2021, our nominations period, voting and awards event will proceeded
- In 2022, our nominations period, voting and awards event will proceed as well. Here’s some details:
- Nominations by Academy members are open, and will remain open until August 31, 2022 as planned
- Voting on nominated art and artists by Academy members will take place throughout September 2022 as planned
- Our awards event will occur in November of this year. With current limitations on social gatherings, the event may look different than it did in past years. Last year we held a virtual event
- We will keep you updated on our planning….so stay tuned!
While Arts Awards continues, we also recognize that the way we experience local art has changed
Since March 2020, many art exhibitions, festivals, and live presentations have been cancelled. At the same time, some artists and art organizations have started to offer their work online, providing live-streamed performances, recordings of readings, video conferencing of events, podcasts, blogs, and more. We know that local artists are still producing and sharing fantastic work. Our plans to honour artists and their work this year includes these realities.