2022 Jack King Award

Announcing the

2022 Jack King Award

The Associated Designers of Canada is thrilled to announce Owen Hutchinson as the 2022 recipient of the $1,500 Jack King Award. The Award is presented annually to a Canadian live performance designer in a pursuit of personal artistic development.

The jury was unanimous in selecting Owen Hutchinson as the 2022 recipient of the award, noting:

The fact that, after almost 20 years, Owen has decided to leave the comfort and stability of the Citadel Theatre shows a true sense of adventure and risk. Leaving the comfort of his past life combined with his goal of taking on research into new ways of working with digital technologies strikes to the heart of the Jack King Award.

About Owen Hutchinson

Owen is a graduate of the Theatre Production program at Grant MacEwan University, and has been nominated for three Sterling awards for his production and design work. Selected design credits include: Arcadia, Make Mine Love, Million Dollar Quartet and 9-5 The Musical (Citadel Theatre, Edmonton), As You Like It (Chicago Shakespeare Theatre) and Drowsy Chaperone (Citadel and National Arts Centre, Ottawa). Operation credits include out of town tryouts of Broadway hits Hadestown, and Six. When not creating theatre, Owen enjoys making feline furniture for the family-owned Douglas Cat Bed Company. Owen lives in Edmonton with his wife Christy and sons Theo and Amos.

Owen is pursuing some personal development in the integration of differing technologies into theatrical design and production. Of particular interest is the relationship between physical sensors and interfaces, and the operation of stage machinery and playback controls. As communications technologies advance, there are many opportunities to allow theatrical design elements to integrate more holistically.

This Year's Selection Committee

Carmen Alatorre

Set and Costume Designer

Originally from Mexico, Carmen is a Latinx artist who earned her MFA degree in Theatre Design at UBC (2010) and lives in the unceded traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations (Vancouver) since 2006. Some of her recent design credits were seen in companies such as: Arts Club Theatre Company, Bard on the Beach, Globe Theatre Regina, Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre, Citadel Theatre and Electric Company. Carmen has taught at UBC and is currently a sessional instructor at UVic. She is also a recipient of three Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards. For more information visit: carmenalatorre.com

Shawn Kerwin

Set and Costume Designer

Shawn Kerwin is a multi-award winning designer of sets and costumes for theatres across Canada as well as in England and the United States. Her work includes designs for new plays, classical plays, opera, musicals, dance, and film. She has also worked on interior and exterior site-specific installations, including Choral Canada’s 2018 project float, spread over a 60-acre farm in St. John’s Newfoundland. For over 6 years she designed windows for Tiffany & Co.’s Toronto flagship store in Toronto.

Michelle Ramsay

Lighting Designer

Michelle is a lighting designer who works with dance, theatre, and opera companies across Canada. Selected designs: The Waltz, among men, acts of faith (Factory Theatre); The First Stone (New Harlem); The Doctors Dilemma, Sherlock Holmes and the Raven’s Curse (Shaw Festival); 9 to 5: The Musical (Capitol Theatre); A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Our Town (Theatre Rusticle); Broken Tailbone (Nightswimming); RUR: A Torrent of Light, Shanawdihit (Tapestry Opera). She has received eight Dora Awards, a SATAward, the 2008 Pauline McGibbon Award, and was a finalist for the 2021 Siminovitch Prize. She is on the Board of the Associated Designers of Canada.