2013 Ruby Awards Winners Announced

Some of the best and brightest of South Australia's arts and cultural professionals have been recognised at the 2013 Ruby Awards.

Among them, ceramics artist Milton Moon AM won top honours with the Premier's Award for Lifetime Achievement. Milton has worked as a ceramics artist for some six decades, both as a lecturer and practising potter. He has been a key figure in developing links between Japanese studio pottery and Australia.

Geoff Cobham, the creative talent behind the look and lighting of many successful Australian productions, festivals and venues, was recognised for Sustained Contribution by an Individual. Geoff's energy and talent can turn the many facets of an event - from lighting to the space itself - from the ordinary to the sublime.

Arts worker Ollie Black was awarded the Geoff Crowhurst Memorial Award for her more than three-decade contribution to community theatre, including co-founding Vitalstatistix Theatre Company in 1984.

Adelaide Cabaret Festival - the largest of its kind in the world - won Sustained Contribution by an Organisation, and the Art Gallery of South Australia's blockbuster Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master was Best Event.

The first major exhibition of iconic British artist Joseph Mallord William Turner's work in almost 20 years lured more than 92,000 visitors to the Art Gallery, a record number of them from outside of South Australia.

The Awards were announced at a gala industry event held (FRIDAY NIGHT) at the Dunstan Playhouse at Adelaide Festival Centre.

The Ruby Awards were introduced in 2006 by the Government of South Australia and are presented by Arts SA. They are non-monetary and open to artists, facilitators, volunteers, cultural sector workers, community participants, private enterprise and not-for profit organisations, as well as State and Local Government and regional organisations.

The Awards are one of the most important ways in which the Government acknowledges and celebrates the contribution of the arts to the cultural life of South Australia.

Here is a full list of the winners in each category:

Best Work:

Pinocchio, Windmill Theatre

Pinocchio builds on Carlo Collodi's original stories, boldly retelling the tale of the wooden boy who wants to be human. Windmill Director RoseMary Myers and her team weave original music and multimedia into Live Theatre, mix in delightful theatre trickery, luscious lighting and animation to create a contemporary celebration of the children's classic.

Best Event:

Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master

Art Gallery of South Australia

This exhibition more than earned its blockbuster status, generating the largest attendance figures in almost 25 years at the Art Gallery of South Australia. It opened in February as part of the Adelaide Festival and lured more than 92,000 visitors - a record number of them from outside the State.

The first major Australian exhibition of Turner's work in almost 20 years included more than 100 of his best-known oil paintings and watercolours, as well as works never before shown. The Art Gallery maximised opportunities to see the exhibition, offering extended opening hours and the ever popular 'Up Late' series to host art lovers afterdark. Curated by eminent Turner scholar Ian Warrell and Art Gallery SA Curator Jane Messenger, Turner from the Tate marked a return of grand international exhibitions to South Australia.

Community Impact Under $100,000:

Auburn Courthouse Cultural Centre, HATs Inc.

Auburn's historic courthouse has been transformed into a performing arts centre, servicing the entire Clare Valley region, which previously had none.

In less than three years, the centre has presented more than 80 events including international acts and national touring artists. The centre has capacity to present about 30 shows a year, from mini-festivals and fundraisers, to a music camp, school shows, choirs and more in a short space of time and without receiving any formal arts funding.

Organisers have lured sponsorships and partnerships, built up their own marketing plan through emails and local traders, and enlisted local volunteers to help at events.

Community Impact Over $100,000:

Just Add Water - 2012 Regional Centre of Culture

Country Arts SA & Alexandrina Council

This year-long program was packed with performances, workshops, exhibitions and community events from the State's leading arts organisations as well as national and local companies. More than 53,000 people converged on Goolwa for the 400-plus events, with thousands more turning out for outdoor art activities as they moved about their day.

Just Add Water left behind a range of legacies for the community to build on.

It brought together country towns and coastal villages of the Alexandrina region, created tangible, permanent reminders in the art works and infrastructure, as well as profound, life-enriching experiences for all involved.

Innovation:

If There Was a Colour Darker than Black, I'd Wear it

Rising Damp, Illuminart & Country Arts SA

This real-time theatrical and online experience immerses the audience in the disappearance of a young man who lives in the town in which the work takes place. Black, as it's known in short, layers theatre, dance, projection, video, music, text and Facebook messages to draw the audience in to the world of Adrian - or ADO. The story unfolds in fragments. The narrative is sparse, even elusive, and the conclusions are uncertain and open to interpretation. What is certain is the impact that Black has on its audience and the force of the multiple art forms employed to tell the story. Black premiered at Kumuwuki/ Big Wave in Goolwa and Country Arts SA is now prepping the show for runs in Mount Gambier and Bathurst.

Arts Enterprise:

Illuminart, Illuminart Productions

This Port Adelaide-based light art collective creates everything from large scale building projections to interactive light sculptures and innovative multimedia works that thrill and inspire. Founded in 2007 by Cindi Drennan, Illuminart has grown from a one-person operation with turnover of $35,000 in year one, to an organisation employing three full time and four part time or casual staff and turnover of $360,000 in year five.

Among Illuminart's notable works was the award-winning Australian first Port Inhabited in October 2011, which featured synchronised, animated projection-mapped narratives along buildings both sides of historic Lipson Street.

Sustained Contribution by an Organisation or Group:

Adelaide Cabaret Festival

The Adelaide Cabaret Festival has grown to be the largest cabaret festival in the world, gleaning plenty of national and international recognition in recent years. Very much a marketing-led festival, Cabaret positions Adelaide as the Australian centre for cabaret. It's fun, it's inclusive, it takes over the Adelaide Festival Centre for some 18 days and plays host to local, national and International Artists with some big names - think Molly Ringwald and Kristin Chenoweth - thrown in for good measure.

In 2013, the 13th annual Cabaret Festival achieved a record box office - up more than 20 percent from 2012. Coinciding with the 40th Anniversary of the Adelaide Festival Centre made this year's celebrations all the more festive.

Sustained Contribution by an Individual:

Geoff Cobham

If you've seen a show or been to an event and noticed the lighting, the set or the sheer quirkiness of a venue, chances are Geoff Cobham was involved.

Geoff has worked as a production manager, lighting designer, set designer, event producer and venue designer.

His company Bluebottle has designed lighting for galleries, museums and buildings, and provided consultancy on Theatre Projects.

Among the productions nominated in this year's Ruby Awards, for instance, Geoff was involved in Windmill's Pinocchio, State Theatre's Hedda Gabler and Slingsby's Ode to Nonsense.

His energy and talent can turn the many facets of an event - from lighting to the space itself - from the ordinary to the sublime.

In 2010, Geoff Cobham received a Churchill Fellowship to study Outdoor Theatre in Europe. He is a multiple Helpmann, Sydney Critics Circle, Greenroom, Adelaide Critics Circle and Curtain Call winner.

Geoff has been a Production Manager of festivals in Adelaide and interstate, including Sydney Festival, WOMADelaide, Come Out and the Adelaide Festival. He was also the visionary behind the ever-popular Adelaide Festival afterclub Barrio, as well as its predecessors including Red Square and Persian Garden.

To paraphrase on of the many glowing testimonials for Geoff's nomination: we are fortunate to have an artist of his calibre make his base here. The time is right to recognise his long and fruitful contribution to the arts.

Geoff Crowhurst Memorial Award:

Ollie Black

Ollie Black is a professional arts worker with more than 30 years experience in community theatre. Ollie has co-founded theatre companies including Melbourne's Wimmin's Circus in 1980 and Vitalstatistix in Adelaide in 1984.

In January, she began working part time at Country Arts SA as Manager, Arts and Cultural Development, overseeing the Indigenous program and as Arts Officer for the Adelaide Hills region and Barossa. Ollie has had many years experience working as a community cultural development worker in South Australia, including some time working at Community Arts Network SA as a trainer and project officer as well as community liaison for the Fringe Parade.

Most recently she was the Just Add Water Project Officer in Goolwa as part of the Regional Centre of Culture.

Premier's Award for Lifetime Achievement:

Milton Moon AM

Milton Moon AM has been a ceramic artist for some six decades: he has been both a lecturer and practising potter, and a key figure in developing links between Japanese studio pottery and Australia. Milton has studied in many countries, as a recipient of a foundation Winston Churchill Fellowship and also as a Myer Foundation Geijutsu Fellow.

His work is in all major Australian Collections.

As one of Australia's most senior potters, he was made a Member of the Order of Australia and then in 1991 he was accorded a retrospective of his work, covering a period of thirty-five years, at the Art Gallery of South Australia.

He received an Advance Australia Foundation Award and then in 1993, for a period of five years, he became a recipient of the most prestigious of art awards given by the Australian Government, an Australian Artists Creative Fellowship.

His accolades and awards go on - and Milton has documented much of his thinking in five published books, including The Zen Master, the Potter and the Poet, followed by a 2010 publication A Potter's Pilgrimage, published by Wakefield Press.

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