Michael Snow first winner of new contemporary art award

Influential Canadian experimental filmmaker and contemporary artist Michael Snow will be honoured with the first MOCCA Award in Contemporary Art on Thursday.

The $10,000 MOCCA Award, from the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art in Toronto, is being awarded to Snow for lifetime achievement in innovative contemporary art.

Toronto-based Snow, 78, works in painting, sculpture, video, films, photography, holography, drawing, books and music.

Among his best-known sculptures are two works in Toronto: the flock of flying Canada geese at the Eaton Centre, called Flight Stop, and the gold-painted figures of fans, called The Audience, over the entrance of the Rogers Centre.

Snow is known for experimental films such as Wavelength, La Rgion Centrale and Corpus Callosum and his works have premiered atfestivals all over the world.

Since 1962, much of his gallery work has been photos or holographs.

Internationally renowned, he has had exhibitions all over the world and sold work to private and public collections.

The National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa,the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Museum Ludwig in Cologne and Vienna, Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris and the Muse des Beaux-Arts and Muse d'art contemporain in Montreal all own works by Snow.

He has received numerous awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1975 and the Order of Canada in 1982.

The award is being presented at a gala dinner Thursday in Toronto, highlighting significant accomplishments and works fromSnow's extensive artistic career.

The award is to be given annually for lifetime achievement or for specific projects that advance contemporary art in Canada.