11 05 2007 - DIAMOND AWARDS FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN THE ARTS HONOREES ANNOUNCED

Title: Diamond Award Honorees Announced for 2007
Dates: 4/23/2007 - 6/30/2007 (A.Melkian)
The City of Glendale Parks, Recreation and Community Services Department and the Arts and Culture Commission are pleased to announce the winners of the Annual Diamond Awards for Achievement in the Arts. The winners will be recognized at a public reception on Saturday, June 9, from 6:00 to 9:00 pm at Pacific Community Center, 501 S. Pacific Ave. in Glendale.

The Diamond Awards was established to recognize those artists, community members and organizations who have contributed substantially to the cultural life of the community. Nominations were solicited from the community in all categories. Selection panelists reviewed nominations and made recommendations to the Arts and Culture Commission, who approved them at their March meeting.

The following winners have been selected as Diamond Award recipients for 2007:

Julia Heron Metzler, Young Artist
Anna Djanbazian, Artist
Kultura Philippine Folk Arts, Arts Organization
Fran Buchanan, Community Partner - Individual
Citibank (700 N. Brand), Community Partner – Business
Vladimir Atanian, Lifetime Achievement

The event on June 9 will include a silent auction, buffet supper, award ceremony and performances by Julia Heron Metzler, Djanbazian Dance Academy and Kultura Philippine Folk Arts. Tickets are $25 each in advance or $30 at the door.

The mission of the City’s Arts and Culture Commission is to enrich the human experience, to reinforce Glendale’s identity and civic pride through arts and culture and to recognize the importance of arts to our quality of life and to the local economy. Through establishing these awards, the Commission hopes to draw attention to the important contributions made by artists, arts organizations, and arts supporters to the quality of life and economic enhancement of the community, as well as encourage volunteerism and business participation with local arts organizations.

Profiles of the award winners are attached. For additional information or to purchase tickets please contact Eve Rappoport at (818) 548-2780.

Diamond Award Recipient Profiles

Julia Heron Metzler, 17, is a classical singer with a warm mezzo-soprano voice. She is an independent study high school senior attending Glendale Community College while pursuing an active singing career. A selection of her accomplishments include 2007 Presidential Scholar in the Arts semi-finalist, The 2007 Mrs. Helen L. Bing youngArts Winner in Voice award bestowed by the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, First Place in Classical Voice for the Los Angeles Music Center Spotlight Awards Competition, First Place winner in the Southern California Regional Classical Singer ’07 High School Voice Competition, and the youngest member of the Los Angeles Master Chorale. She has made a conscious decision to not only make a career of classical music and opera, but to use her talents to raise funds for causes she deeply believes in.

Anna Djanbazian is a dancer, choreographer, teacher and artistic director of Djanbazian Dance Company. She has made it her lifetime goal to try to breakdown the cultural barriers among youth by increasing their awareness and understanding of aesthetic and ethnically diverse dance forms and providing a forum for dissemination of information about the art and culture of dance. She has been teaching dance for over 20 years in Glendale. Djanbazian Dance Company’s repertoire includes a wide variety of genres, from classical ballet to modern to traditional folk dances. Recent awards include 4 first prize honors in 4 categories at the Lester Horton Dance Awards and awards in the Grand Prix Festival of Dance in Italy for both the choreography of traditional Persian folk and contemporary modern dances.

Kultura Philippine Folk Arts was founded in Glendale in 1992 by Celia deFato to preserve and promote the richness and diversity of Philippine culture through the arts. Since their inception, they have maintained an exceptional level of cultural, artistic and organizational achievement and have nurtured an extensive network of member participants, volunteers, audiences and collaborators. They have performed at over 450 events, reaching an estimated audience of 390,000. Additionally they offer cultural workshops for children age 5 and above. This year marks the groups’ 15th anniversary, which they will be celebrating by presenting “KROMA KULTURA”, in partnership with the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the Ford Theatre Foundation at the Ford Amphitheatre on August 4.

Fran Buchanan has been a generous and long-time supporter of many arts and community organizations in Glendale as far back as the 1960s. She was nominated specifically for her long-time generosity towards the Glendale Symphony Orchestra, which started when Carmen Dragon was conductor. Recently she was responsible for the success of a matching grant for the symphony in 2004, the Glendale Symphony Student Violin Scholarship program in 2005 and an operational grant in 2006. In addition to serving on the Board of Directors, she has provided office space for the Glendale Symphony Orchestra Association. Fran also runs a successful real estate business, Buchanan Associates.

Citibank (700 N. Brand), Nancy Lenik, Branch Manager was nominated for their on-going generosity towards the Glendale Art Association. Since Citibank acquired this bank location in 2003, they have continued the tradition begun in 1991 of allowing the Glendale Art Association to display and sell member works on a regular basis. Staff at Citibank has been friendly and cooperative in providing free gallery space, providing a service to their customers as well as to local artists. Awards

Vladimir Atanian is an accomplished visual artist as well as beloved arts educator. He founded Glendale’s Atanian Art Center in 1993 with the mission of giving children an overall artistic education in an environment that allows them to develop their own creative identities. He has been a teacher for 40 years, raising two generations of artists in Armenia, and one (so far) in America. Since completing his education at Yerevan State Institute of Fine Arts, he has exhibited in more than 200 group and solo shows throughout the world. His artworks are in several hundred private and public international permanent collections. And he has completed many monumental and permanent public artworks in Armenia, Russia, Burbank and Glendale. Two of his most notable recent commissions include COLORAMA at Pacific Community Center and MUSE at the Burbank Senior Artists Colony. To quote Antoinette A. Sullivan, art consultant, “The immediate impact of Vladimir Atanian’s works is sensory: movement in many directions with swirls and patches of color, light & dark, positive & negative. Then personalities emerge: romance, mystery, intrigue and humor. In the voluptuous and sensuous lines of his sculpture or the cubist lines of his canvasses, he is a master at painting, mixed media and sculpture.”

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Contact: Eve Rappoport (818) 548-2780
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 19, 2007

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