THE 2013 “CityNews” Artist of the Year is Christopher Latham, director of the Canberra International Music Festival.

At the ACT Arts Awards ceremony, at the Canberra Museum and Gallery, ceramic artist Hiroe Swen presented Latham with the magazine’s $1000 prize and a ceramic work of her own.

“I’m extremely touched, this is very meaningful,” Latham told “CityNews”.

“I have a strange compulsion to do what I do, but it is gratifying for people to say ‘you did it’ in such an ephemeral art form.”

Latham was singled out for his visionary directing of the music festival and particularly for his extraordinary ability to identify the essential features of Canberra’s architecture and lifestyle, creating a festival program using some of our most famous buildings, from the Shine Dome to the Australian War Memorial, to help broaden audience appeal.

The judges from the Canberra Critics’ Circle also commented on his practise of engaging young and emerging music performers in the program, enabling them to advance their careers by working in collaboration with respected composers and performers.

Trained as a classical violinist, Latham is also an active conductor and the musical director for the Gallipoli Symphony, travelling to Turkey each year to conduct this evolving work, commissioned by the Department of Veteran Affairs.

The founder and director of the Voices in the Forest outdoor concert at the National Arboretum, he is also an eloquent advocate for the musical use of the J S Murdoch building now known as the Ainslie Arts Centre.

The awards evening, hosted by the Canberra Critics’ Circle, also featured the Circle’s own arts awards and the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance’s Green Room awards.

The 2013 Canberra Critics’ Circle awards went to: filmmaker Clare Young; writers Lesley Lebkowicz, Irma Gold and Robert Macklin; the Scissors Paper Pen collective; dance artists Elizabeth Cameron Dalman and Liz Lea; Jeff Wayne’s “War of the Worlds” by SUPA Productions; musical theatre artists Dave Smith and Anne Somes;

musicians Adam Cook, Leisa Keen, Michael Sollis, Christopher Latham, Bradley Kunda and Matt Withers; The Musical Offering initiative; composer Sandra France and librettist Helen Nourse; visual artists Valerie Kirk Anita McIntyre, G W Bot and Wendy Teakel, Jenni Kemarre Martiniello, Eleanor Gates-Stuart, Jo Hollier, Luna Ryan and Jock Puautjimi; Canberra Contemporary Art Space; theatre artists Chrissie Shaw, Jenna Roberts and Duncan Ley; the productions “The Book of Everything” by REP and “Pea!” by serious theatre.

The MEAA Green Room Award was presented by ACT Branch Secretary Michael White to performer Chrissie Shaw. The 2013 MEAA Peer Recognition Award went to dramaturg Peter Matheson.