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Ottawa, 13 July 1998 --The Canada Council for the Arts today announced that Montreal choreographer, teacher and dancer Elizabeth Langley is the winner of the 33rd Jacqueline Lemieux Prize.

The Jacqueline Lemieux Prize, which consists of a medal and a cheque for $6,000, is awarded to the most deserving applicant in the Dance Section's program of Project Grants - Discovery. The assessment committee members described Elizabeth Langley as "an inspiration to the community who stretches the boundaries of the art form" and praised her "command of the direction she has chosen to move in, and the strength and power with which she is doing it." The committee comprised Zab Maboungou, Montreal; Kenny Pearl, Toronto; Cheryl Prophet, Vancouver; and Davida Monk, Calgary.

Elizabeth Langley's project submitted to the 1997 competition consisted of the creation of a solo dance work based on movement studies submitted by her former graduate students at Concordia University. Elizabeth Langley influenced a whole generation of dance professionals, and many of the contributors to this project (Zelma Badu, Jacques Brochu, Sylvain Delisle, Florence Figols, Jeff Hall, Yoojin Jin and Pierre-Paul Savoie) are now important dance artists in their own right. They have provided feedback on the crystallization of the work premiered in Montreal last May, which Langley also intends to present in Ottawa and Toronto.

The Jacqueline Lemieux Prize is awarded in memory of Jacqueline Lemieux's profound contribution to Canadian dance. Co-founder with her husband, Lawrence Gradus, of the Montreal dance company Entre-Six and of Québec Été Danse, a summer school in Lennoxville, Jacqueline Lemieux was a teacher, administrator and a member of the Canada Council for the Arts' Advisory Arts Panel.

ELIZABETH LANGLEY

Elizabeth Langley has been professionally involved in dance for 45 years. She was born in Melbourne, Australia, in 1933 and spent her primary formative years there as a company performer, interpreter, choreographer and teacher. From 1960 to 1965 she lived in New York, where she trained in Martha Graham technique and experienced the American dance scene. In 1965, Langley moved to Canada and resumed her earlier role of dancer, teacher and performance creator in the community. She began her university tenure in 1979, when she became responsible for the development, teaching and administration of the Contemporary Dance Degree Program at Concordia University.

Recently, during a two-year sabbatical, she took the opportunity to concentrate on personal artistic development as a guest student at The School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam, where she was able to take the time to study new material, refine and apply her research to her technical development and perform extensively. On her return to Canada in January 1997, she became involved with various projects - assistant director for Maxine Heppner, studio consultant for Denise Fujiwara, solo performer at the Dance Network in Ottawa and at series 8:08 in Toronto, and workshop teacher in both Ottawa and Toronto.

Langley retired from her university career in June 1997. This project is a celebration of her 45 years as a professional in the discipline of contemporary dance and her 65th birthday, as well as an important step in the re-establishment of the performance element of her creative life.

The Canada Council for the Arts, in addition to its principal role of promoting and fostering the arts in Canada, administers and awards a number of distinguished prizes in the arts, humanities, social sciences, natural and health sciences, and engineering. Among these are the Glenn Gould Prize, the Killam Prizes, the Canada Council for the Arts Molson Prizes and the Governor General's Literary Awards.

For more information about these awards, including nomination procedures, contact Carol Bream, Director of Endowments and Prizes, at (613) 566-4414, or 1-800-263-5588, ext. 5041. E-mail: carol.bream@canadacouncil.ca.

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