Tanne Foundation Announces Artist Awards

The Tanne Foundation is pleased to announce the recipients of its 2017 awards. Now in its nineteenth year, the foundation's mission is to underscore the importance of supporting individual artists with unrestricted funding. The awards totaling $53,300 honor five artists in recognition of their artistic achievements as well as one artist-run organization which has presented exceptional work for 40 years.

2017 Tanne Award Recipients

Gary Bates, Manhattan, MT, a sculptor

Bates builds sculptures that have a reciprocal relationship with nature. His sculptures are powered by the environment they inhabit, wind or rain, and become visual symbols of that environment. Bates makes public art because he wants to reach people in the most democratic way. His unique sculptures are in many public art collections including Rocky Mountain College, Yellowstone Art Center, Central Washington State as well as the campus of Montana State University. He has exhibited widely throughout the United States and his work is included in many private collections.

Chris Ensweiler, Seattle, WA, an actor
When he lived in Atlanta, Georgia, he was a resident actor and Company Manager with Georgia Shakespeare for seven seasons, creating Shakespeare clowns in a myriad of modern settings. In Seattle, Ensweiler works at major regional theaters, small professional theaters and festivals, appearing in contemporary and classical plays, new works and musicals. As a theatre collaborator, he actively supports his community through audience outreach, coaching other professional actors and mentoring young artists.

Todd McCutcheon, Indianapolis, IN, a mixed media painter
His current series of paintings are motivated by the Avant-Garde Jazz Community which is very active in the Midwest and New York City. Heavily based in cartoon imagery mixed with geometric abstraction, his paintings act as a portal into a personal universe. Since 1998 his work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally, including The Gallery in Cork Street, London; The Sarah Bain Gallery in Fullerton, CA; and Gallery 924 in Indianapolis, IN. His works have appeared in ARTnews and New American Paintings. His paintings are in the Permanent Collection of the Savannah College of Art and Design and in numerous private collections.

Red Shuttleworth, Moses Lake, WA, a poet/playwright
Shuttleworth is a cowboy poet in the rural West living in the wide open spaces. His latest poetry book is Straight Ahead (Blue Horse Press, 2017). His poems have appeared in countless journals, including Ontario Review, Prairie Schooner, and Weber: The Contemporary West. In 2007 True West magazine named Red "Best Living Western Poet." He is the recipient of a 2016 Western Heritage "Wrangler" Award for poetry and three Western Writers of America Spur Awards. His plays have been presented widely, including at Saddleback College, Sundance Playwrights Lab, the State University of New York of Fredonia, and the Utah Shakespeare Festival.

Preach R. Sun, U.S.-based fugitivist, conjurer & performance-art activist

His guerilla actions are performed on the street and in festivals and galleries. He employs performance art and video as tools for social change, to further his mission of liberation. His work reflects his background growing up as the son of a minister, and his training in dance, theater and the fine arts. In his words, "Freedom is my creative praxis. My work serves as an investigative inquiry into the nature and limits of human freedom. I create works to bring focus to the potential of art as activism, as vehicles for conjuring liberation."

Mobius, Inc., Boston, MA, an artist-run non-profit, tax-exempt organization
It has presented an exceptional range of visual, performance and multi-media arts for 40 years. The Mobius Artists Group collectively manages the organization. Their basis of artistic investigation has been to negotiate the space between creative people, creative people and the general public, between art and public space and among artistic media. The artists have presented their work throughout the United States, Canada, South America, Europe and Asia. Mobius is a previous recipient of the Tanne Award.

About the Tanne Foundation

The Tanne Foundation was founded by an artist in order to enrich the artistic experience and broaden horizons for artists and audiences alike. The foundation's primary interest is in the support of individual artists. Led by a board comprised primarily of artists, the foundation is guided by the philosophy that in the creation of art, however unrecognized or obscure the voice, the sound may be extraordinary and it is vital that it be heard.

Since its inception the foundation has made awards to ninety-eight artists and nine organizations in recognition of their outstanding achievements in a variety of fields in the visual and performing arts, including performance art, painting, poetry, music, theater, and dance. Nominations for awards are made by the trustees of the Tanne Foundation. The foundation does not accept unsolicited requests.

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