Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts Commissions Popular Canadian Artist, Dean Lauzé

VANCOUVER -- The producers of the Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts (CAEAA) are extremely pleased to announce that prominent Canadian artist Dean Lauzé has accepted their commission to bring into being the artist rendering and the sculpture from which the subsequent mold for the CAEAA awards statuette will be created.

A classically trained artist, Lauzé benefited from the private mentorship of the acclaimed lithographer Mircho Jackabow and such luminaries as the graphic designer, Paul Kuzma and sculptor John Weaver. Lauzé has extensive experience in most drawing and painting mediums, print-making, sculpture and graphic design. Lauzé has earned renown as one Vancouver’s top commercial artists and has built his reputation on the principles of integrity and excellence. Dean Lauzé and his wife Christina and their team of five make up D’Arts, a commercial art company which integrates classical skills with modern innovations, and it is for these reasons that the Producers of the CAEAA chose Lauzé. “We felt that Dean was the perfect choice as the artist who would craft our statuette as the industries we are awarding create much of their work using the same two methods of art,” explains CAEAA Producer, Holly Carinci.

The design and the name for the CAEAA statuette came to Carinci two months ago during a typical sleepless producer’s night, and she and her team have been looking for the perfect artist ever since. “Dean was suggested to us by an artist from EA, one of our many important sponsors for the event,” recalls Carinci. “We knew immediately that we’d found the right person to bring to life this image I have in my mind, an image which I am horribly incapable of reproducing myself in any way.” Within one week of that recommendation the producers were ecstatic to learn that they had Dean’s and Christina’s support.

Some of Dean Lauzé’s and his D’Arts company’s work includes the bronze Unity Statue in Abbotsford Civic Square, the 7-foot-high hockey cards in the corridor at GM Place, nine of the Orca whales and seven of the Spirit bears displayed around Vancouver. His stunning mural work is seen in countless locations and is commissioned privately for homes as well as companies such as Mercedes Benz and Bell Canada.

The official name and artist rendering for the CAEAA statuette is currently top secret. An invitation-only unveiling will be announced sometime in late June.

The first annual Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts (CAEAA 2006) will take place on Thursday, September 14th, 2006, at the fabulous River Rock Theatre in Richmond, a suburb of Vancouver. This year’s awards event will honour Canadian achievements in three sectors of the Electronic and Animated Arts industry: talent development (New Media and Animation Art Schools), animation, and video game development.

Sponsors already behind the Canadian Awards for the Electronic and Animated Arts 2006 include EA, Ubisoft, A2M, Auto Desk, Foundation 9, Studio B, Voicebox, Nitrogen, Bardel, Western Imperial, David Kaye Productions, Budget Monks, British Columbia Film, Sheridan Institute, VanArts, Selkirk College, and The Art Institute of Vancouver.