Spectrum 26 Awards Recipients! Congratulations to all!
For 26 years Spectrum: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art has been celebrating imaginative works by creators from around the world.
The Spectrum Awards Ceremony was held in Kansas City, Missouri on Saturday night, March 30, 2019. Entry was free for all Planet Comicon and Spectrum Fantastic Art Live event ticket holders and exhibitors. Nearly 500 people were in attendance.
The celebration included the presentation of Gold and Silver Awards for exemplary art from the previous year in eight categories: Advertising, Book, Comics, Concept Art, Dimensional, Editorial, Institutional, and Unpublished. The ceremony was held in the historic Folly Theater. Presenters included such luminaries of the art community as Patricia Briggs (Book category), Bill Carman (Institutional category), John English (Advertising category), Dan dos Santos (Grand Master award), Gary Gianni (Comic category), Cory Godbey (Unpublished category), Iain McCaig (Concept Art category), Colin and Kristine Poole (Rising Star and Dimensional category), and Zoë Robinson (Editorial category). Spectrum founders Cathy and Arnie Fenner introduced a memorial video devoted to the creatives who had passed away in the previous year. Bob Self and Lauren Panepinto served as the hosts during the ceremony. John Fleskes and Katherine Chu offered a thank you speech to close the ceremony, while “Stand Up Magician” Derek Hughes performed during the evening.
The 5 finalists and award-recipients in each category were selected by the jury consisting of Kei Acedera, Wesley Burt, Bobby Chiu, Edward Kinsella III, Colin and Kristine Poole from over 4000 artworks submitted to the twenty-sixth annual competition. Also presented at the ceremony were the Rising Star Award, created and presented by sculptors Kristine and Colin Poole and intended to encourage a young artist, and the Spectrum Grand Master Award which honors the career accomplishments of a living artist. This year’s Grand Master recipient was Donato Giancola, who was present to accept his award.
The Spectrum 26 awards were designed and made by J. Anthony Kosar and his team at Kosart Effects Studio.
The award-winning art will appear with over 500 other pieces selected by the judges in the Spectrum 26 book, which will be published by Flesk Publications in November 2019.
Congratulations to everyone who was nominated and to the recipients!
Spectrum 26 Awards Recipients
2017 GRAND MASTER HONOREE
Donato Giancola
RISING STAR AWARD
Ki Gawki
ADVERTISING CATEGORY
GOLD
Greg Ruth
SILVER
Valentin Kopetzki
BOOK CATEGORY
GOLD
Francis Vallejo
SILVER
Chase Stone
COMIC CATEGORY
GOLD
Alex Alice
SILVER
Jeffrey Alan Love
CONCEPT ART CATEGORY
GOLD
Abe Taraky
SILVER
Danny Moll
DIMENSIONAL CATEGORY
GOLD
Patrick Masson
SILVER
Paul Komoda
EDITORIAL CATEGORY
GOLD
Qiuxin Mao
SILVER
Leonardo Santamaria
INSTITUTIONAL CATEGORY
GOLD
Jesper Ejsing
SILVER
John Jude Palencar
UNPUBLISHED CATEGORY
GOLD
Konstantin Kostadinov
SILVER
Annie Stegg Gerard
Enjoy,
John
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Text and photos copyright © 2019 John Fleskes. Videos © 2019 Flesk Publications. Artwork © 2019 its respective artists. All Rights reserved.