The Canadian Conference of the Arts announces its National Arts Award winners for 2005

OTTAWA – The Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts (CCA) is pleased to announce Nini
Baird and Roch Car­rier as its national arts award win­ners for 2005. The 2005 National
Arts Awards cer­e­mony will take place at the National Arts Cen­tre in Ottawa on
Sep­tem­ber 28, 2005 from 6-9pm.
The Keith Kelly Award for Cul­tural Lead­er­ship will be pre­sented to one of Canada’s
long time arts advo­cate Nini Baird. A West Van­cou­ver res­i­dent for many years, Nini
Baird has devoted 40 years to the man­age­ment; pro­mo­tion and fund­ing of the arts and
edu­ca­tional broad­cast­ing in British Colum­bia, with exten­sive expe­ri­ence on the
munic­i­pal, provin­cial, fed­eral and inter­na­tional lev­els. Her career reflects her
com­mit­ment to the impor­tance of art and artists in the lives of Cana­di­ans of all ages.
She was a found­ing mem­ber of the BC Arts Coun­cil in 1996 (Vice Chair 1998–2001,
Chair 2001–2003). She cur­rently serves as Chair of the TELUS Van­cou­ver Com­mu­nity
Board as well as on the boards of British Colum­bia Film and the Leon and Thea Koerner
Foun­da­tion. She was TELUS Foun­da­tion Advi­sory Board (Chair) until 2004 and board
mem­ber of Van­cou­ver Arts Sta­bi­liza­tion (VAST) until 2005. In 1993 she was named a
mem­ber of the Order of Canada.
Oksana Dex­ter, Cul­tural Ser­vices Man­ager for West Van­cou­ver said of Baird, “For many
of us, Nini Baird has been a role model. She has suc­cess­fully nav­i­gated through the
polit­i­cal shoals in a vari­ety of high-level roles to achieve key mile­stones in cul­tural
lead­er­ship, and I believe that this award more than any oth­ers would hon­our the
essence of her life­time com­mit­ment to the cul­tural devel­op­ment of Van­cou­ver, British
Colum­bia and Canada.”
The Keith Kelly Award for Cul­tural Lead­er­ship has been awarded annu­ally since 1998,
when it was estab­lished to rec­og­nize the lead­er­ship shown by the for­mer National
Direc­tor of the CCA dur­ing his tenure from 1989–98. It is pre­sented to a Cana­dian who
has made a sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion to the arts through advo­cacy work or the
devel­op­ment of cul­tural pol­icy, or who has oth­er­wise demon­strated lead­er­ship in the
field. The award is an inscribed medal designed by Ottawa medal­lic artist Susan Tay­lor.
The Diplôme d’honneur will be pre­sented to a pro­lific con­tem­po­rary Que­be­cois author,
Roch Car­rier. Roch Car­rier has a num­ber of works to his credit, and has received many
prizes and hon­ours, among them the 1991 Stephen Lea­cock Prize for humour for
Prayers of a Very Wise Child. His inspi­ra­tion often has an auto­bi­o­graph­i­cal source, and
he likes to describe the lives of peo­ple here and else­where. Roch Car­rier is also known
for his books for chil­dren, most notably The Hockey Sweater. Roch Car­rier is, with­out
doubt, one of the most-read Que­be­cois authors in Canada. He has served as Canada’s
National Librar­ian from Octo­ber 1, 1999 to May 25, 2004.
“Through his writ­ings and his actions, Roch Car­rier, the Que­bec author who has also
lived in New Brunswick and Ontario, touches peo­ple of all ages and all back­grounds. He
has an abil­ity to tell sto­ries based on char­ac­ters and sit­u­a­tions well grounded in real­ity
that depict deep con­cerns. He is also very com­mit­ted to the devel­op­ment of per­ma­nent
cul­tural insti­tu­tions. Both aspects crys­tal­lize, in my view, the fun­da­men­tal role that the
artist plays in com­mu­nity devel­op­ment,” says film­maker Marie Cadieux about Roch
Car­rier.
The Diplôme d’honneur is pre­sented annu­ally to in recog­ni­tion of a sus­tained
con­tri­bu­tion to the cul­tural life of the coun­try, whether through vol­un­teer activ­ity,
men­tor­ing, patron­age, indi­vid­ual arts prac­tice or other rec­og­nized sup­port. More than 70
of the vision­ar­ies and cre­ators of Canada’s rich cul­tural iden­tity, includ­ing Glenn Gould,
Mau­reen For­rester, Oscar Peter­son, and Pierre Juneau have been rec­og­nized since the
award’s incep­tion in 1954. The award is in the form of a sil­ver tal­is­man designed by the
late West Coast craft­smith, Bill Reid.
Recip­i­ents of the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts National Arts Awards are selected by
the CCA’s Awards Com­mit­tee, based on nom­i­na­tions received from CCA mem­bers.
For more infor­ma­tion on the CCA Awards, see http://www.ccarts.ca/en/awards/
This year’s cer­e­mony will be held Thurs­day, Sep­tem­ber 28, 2005 from 6:00 p.m. to
10:00 p.m. at the National Arts Cen­tre (53 Elgin Street, Ottawa). Tick­ets for the CCA’s
60th anniver­sary din­ner and awards cer­e­mony can be pur­chased for $60.00 by
con­tact­ing Jes­sica Pan­coe by phone at: 613.238.3561 ext.10 or by email at:
jessica.pancoe@ccarts.ca.
Sixty years strong, the Cana­dian Con­fer­ence of the Arts is the national forum for the arts and
cul­tural com­mu­nity in Canada. It serves as a leader, author­ity, and cat­a­lyst to ensure that artists
can con­tribute freely and fully to a cre­ative, dynamic, and civil Cana­dian soci­ety.
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