Behind the Scenes at Stuart Ng Books: #LightboxExpo2019 -- Concept Art Awards (5 of 5) UPDATED 9.10.21

Thanks to these two dedicated women...
Rachel Meinerding (l) and Nicole Hendrix (r)....

(from the Concept Art Awards show program)

....the Concept Art Association (CAA) was launched. https://www.conceptartassociation.com/

The mission: "elevating and raising the profile of concept artists, their art and their involvement in various entertainment industries."

These founders share a common aim. ".... to help concept artists' names and their art be associated together in as many places as possible."

Indie art life -- even at the highest levels of the industry -- often lacks hard-earned credit and compensation. The CAA is a way to help change that paradigm.

Awareness. Education. Access. Opportunity. Inclusion. These are the steps that will bring change. Raising awareness with fans and the press will help support artist rights and bring positive outcomes for indie artists. The sharing of images online fuel social media, and film franchise success. It's about time the artists who make these images get the recognition they've earned.

This theme of elevating artists is also part of the mission of Lightbox Expo, which sponsored the first ever Concept Art Awards.

Click on image below to enlarge. Front and back of promotional postcard about the awards.

These next images are my photos from awards night...

Pre-show inside the main ballroom at the Pasadena Convention Center

Concept Art Awards program -- cover art by Iain McCaig.

CAA co-founders Nicole Hendrix (l) and Rachel Meinerding (r)

Highlights of the evening were the Lifetime Achievement Awards:

Ron Cobb
Ralph McQuarrie
H.R. Giger
Jean Giraud
Syd Mead

Each presentation had a thoughtful message from the presenter.
Many who received the awards in honor of these icons were family members or close friends.

Below is a photo of a recorded message from a daughter of the late Jean "Moebius" Giraud. This award was presented by Jean-Jacques and Diane Launier, owners of Gallery Arludik in Paris https://www.arludik.com/indexeng2.htm.

Syd Mead was unable to attend in person, but sent a recorded message.

The award trophies were created and provided by Legacy Effects.
(photo below by Kelly Dwyer, courtesy of Nicole Hendrix)

(photo below by Kelly Dwyer, courtesy of Nicole Hendrix)

For Stuart Ng Books...
it was an especially memorable night. Stuart was honored for his 20+ years of service to artists. He was the inaugural recipient of the Lightbox Community Icon Award. (next 4 photos by AW).

The award is presented as one of the Concept Art Award trophies, but this is a community service recognition voted on my the Lightbox Advisory Council and announced at the Concept Art Awards. It reflects on the mission of both CAA and the Expo organizers that they team up to include this honor on a night celebrating artists. The Lightbox Community Icon award recognizes a community member who might not be an artist themselves, but have been a valued resource for creative professionals.

Black and white pic below shows Stuart receiving the Award. Photo by Keith Acedera, from the Lightbox Expo Facebook page. Here's the text from the site's FB post:
✨#LBX2019 Moments✨
We worked alongside the Concept Art Association in creating the LightBox Community Icon Award., which recognizes an individual or group who has demonstrated an outstanding contribution to the art community. This year's winner was the one & only, Stuart Ng! 👏🏼

Below is Stuart just after the event...

Here is the award on display at the SNB Store.

(Subscribers on the Stuart Ng Books mailing list get Stuart's weekly newsletter .. where he reported on the award. https://stuartngbooks.com/join-our-mailing-list.html)

UPDATE 9.10.21

The "Concept Art Association" You Tube channel has videos for all the in person awards from Lightbox Expo 2019. Stuart's short speech starts at appx 4:20 in this clip.

UPDATE
Link for 9.13.19 article with complete list of inaugural winners...
https://www.animationmagazine.net/events/inaugural-winners-of-lightbox-concept-art-awards-announced/

The entire Concept Art Awards program was recorded. When the link becomes available I'll include information about it here.

Meanwhile -- many thanks to Nicole Hendrix and Rachel Meinerding for an incredible evening celebrating artists.

Special thanks to Nicole for permission to use here on the blog some official photographs of the event (taken by https://www.kellyrdwyer.com/photo) (the 3 images below and the two trophy images above)

Stuart (center) with Bobby Chiu (left) and Jim Demonakos (right)