2021 International Costumers’ Guild Lifetime Achievement Award

Philip and Kathleen Gust at Costume-Con 33. Photo by Kenneth T. Warren

Philip and Kathleen Gust are the recipients of the 2021 International Costumers’ Guild Lifetime Achievement Award. ICG President Kevin Roche shared the announcement on April 24. The award is the highest honor that the International Costumers’ Guild’s presents to costumers, recognizing a body of achievement in the costuming art and service to the costuming community.

The ICG Lifetime Achievement Award citation highlights their achievements:

Phil and Kathe Gust made a splash in the San Francisco Bay Area costuming community 18 years ago, with Lord of the Rings costumes featuring King Theoden of Rohan and Eowyn of Rohan. After winning a “Rising Star” award from the GBACG (Greater Bay Area Costumer’s Guild), a tie-award for a best-of workmanship title in the Novice category, and the winner of the Best Fantasy Costume in the Masquerade at BayCon (a large regional convention) in 2006, their rising star was certainly the one to watch!

Both singly and as a couple, Phil and Kathe descended upon the costuming community with glitter, knowledge, and a desire to serve. They have each taught classes at multiple conventions, and for the annual GBACG Costume Academy, on a variety of topics. They have run masquerades at the regional level, and judged at both regional and international competitions.

They have also ably served as officers in multiple roles within the ICG.

The first recipient of the award, in 1990, was Marjii Ellers. Sally Fink won it last year.

International Costumers’ Guild Lifetime Achievement Awards

Sue Kulinyi and Eric Cannon

Eric Cannon and Sue Kulinyi were honored with the International Costumers’ Guild’s 2017 Lifetime Achievement Awards this weekend at Costume-Con 35 in Mississauga, Ontario.

The ICG Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes a body of achievement in the costuming art and service to the costuming community. Candidates for the award:

  • Shall have been active in the costuming community for at least 10 years.
  • Shall have achieved significant recognition for their costuming skills, which may be in the form of, but not restricted to, competitive awards, professional accomplishments, teaching of skills, and/or media recognition.
  • Shall have made significant contributions in service to the costuming community.

The husband and wife team of Eric Cannon and Sue Kulinyi are well-known videographers.

Their award citation says —

[They] make it their mission to make costumers look good onstage for future generations to view, as well as providing DVDs for participants to take home to show off, mere hours after the convention has closed.

As official videographers to many costuming conventions, Eric and Sue use their own equipment and usually have to drive to convention sites, and spend considerable time setting up multiple cameras and attending technical rehearsals because they know how important this will be to the costumers and to the archival process.

They are also active in procuring old videos of past convention masquerades and have preserved this footage, making it available through their company, Rare Recorded Videos. Given the frailty of video tape, much of our costuming past was in danger of being lost forever had it not been for their efforts to collect this footage and donate copies to the ICG Kennedy Archives.

In 2014, Eric undertook to further our history by lobbying the Library of Congress to accept our masquerade DVDs into their archive. Because of his efforts, costuming in all its forms has been “recognized as a legitimate art form.”

Sue sometimes steps in as Stage Manager, a role that includes organizing and coordinating the operation of the main stage, and the operation of lighting and sound for the masquerade contestants. Eric occasionally finds time to participate in masquerades, sitting in the audience in costume to record, then running backstage at the last minute to join a costume group and carefully resuming his position behind the camera when the entry is finished.

Eric and Sue have made a major contributions to the continuation of our hobby and art form. They do this with consummate professionalism and good humour.

A year ago Lisa Ashton was presented the 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award at Costume-Con 34 in Madison, WI.

Lisa Ashton

Her citation reads:

Lisa Ashton has been active in the costuming community since 1989 when she attended her first Worldcon. She has been recognized as a Master Costumer who is renowned for her workmanship, especially in beading.

Known as an expert in 19th century historical costuming, Lisa founded the ICG’s first Special Intrest Group, “Miss Lizzy’s Traveling Historical Fashion Show,” which exhibits selections from her extensive collection of historic clothing, jewelry, photographs, books, and journals about 19th century American dress and domestic life.

Lisa is also is a tireless volunteer in the community, serving on convention committees, presenting on panels at conventions, teaching workshops to share her knowledge and skills, and serving as a presentation and workmanship judge for several dozen Sci-Fi/Fantasy and Historic masquerades.

 

Group photo of ICG Lifetime Achievement Award winners taken in 2016. Left to right: Sandy Pettinger, Nora Mai. Pierre Pettinger, Kevin Roche, Jacqueline Ward, Tina Connell, Ricky Dick, Lisa Ashton, Bruce Mai, Ann Catelli, Dawn McKechnie, Dana MacDermott, Bruce MacDermott, Byron Connell, Karen Schnaubelt. Photo: Scott Johnson. ©2016 Realtime Portrait Studio.

Horror Writers Association 2016 Lifetime Achievement Awards

Dennis Etchison and Thomas F. Monteleone are the Horror Writers Association’s 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award winners.

Etchison, a former President of HWA, said “It’s a great honor to be recognized by my peers.” Monteleone responded, “I am humbled and honored to receive such recognition.”

Dennis Etchison

Etchison is the author of 12 novels and 7 collections, and has edited 9 anthologies. He won the World Fantasy Award three times, for his short story “The Dark Country” (1982) and for the anthologies MetaHorror (1993) and The Museum of Horrors (2002). He has been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award four times. He has won the British Fantasy Award three times for his short fiction “The Dark Country,” “The Olympic Runner” (1987) and “The Dog Park” (1994).

Thomas F. Monteleone in the 1990s.

Thomas F. Monteleone has written over 24 novels, more than 100 short stories, and has edited the Borderlands anthologies with his wife Elizabeth Monteleone. Their Borderlands Press won the HWA Specialty Press Award in 2016.

His non-fiction column “The Mothers and Fathers Italian Association (MAFIA),” featured over the decades in Knights, Horrorstruck, The Horror Show, Mystery Scene, Cemetery Dance, Gaunlet, and Dancing with the Dark, and the award citation says it “has earned him a reputation of honesty and bluntness unsurpassed.”

He is the winner of four Bram Stoker Awards for the novelette “Looking for Mr. Flip” (1996), his collected columns The Mothers and Fathers Italian Association (2004), the anthology Borderlands 5 (2004), and his fiction collection Fearful Symmetries (2005). He is also the author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Writing a Novel.

Both authors will be present to receive their awards at StokerCon (April 27-30) in Long Beach, CA.

Update: I have undone an earlier correction to the award title so I can follow the organization’s own usage. In an answer to my email they explained: “HWA presents a number of awards each year that are not considered part of the Bram Stoker Award categories. The Lifetime Achievement Award is not a Stoker Award, but rather a Horror Writers Association award, similar to the Specialty Press Award and Mentor of the Year Award.”

2016 FAAn Awards

The winners of the 2016 Fan Activity Achievement (FAAn) awards were announced today at Corflu 33 (Chiflu) in Chicago.

The FAAn awards are presented annually to honour the best in fan writing, drawing, publishing and posting, and are voted on by fanzine fans around the world.

The voting statistics have been posted here [PDF file].

More information about this and previous years’ awards, including a full breakdown of the 2016 results, will be available on the Corflu website here.

FAAn AWARD WINNERS

Best Genzine of 2015 (tie)

Best Personal Zine of 2015

Best Special Publication of 2015

  • The MOTA Reader, edited by Dan Steffan

Best Fan Website of 2015

Best Fan Writer of 2015

  • Roy Kettle

Best Fan Artist of 2015

Best Letterhack of 2015 (The Harry Warner, Jr. Memorial Award for Best Fan Correspondent)

  • Paul Skelton

Best Fanzine Cover of 2015

Number One Fan Face of 2015
(not voted, but totalled from the other eight categories)

  • Dan Steffan

Lifetime Achievement Award

The Lifetime Achievement Award has been presented at Corflu since 2010, to honor a living fan for their fan activity over a long career in fandom. It is not a FAAn award; in most years winners have been selected from nominations by a small committee, usually (as this year) including recent Corflu chairs and the FAAn Awards administrator. Previous winners are listed alongside the FAAn awards on the awards history page [link: http://corflu.org/history/faan.html ]

[Thanks to Claire Brialey for the story.]

HWA Lifetime Achievement Award Winners

Stephen Jones and R. L. Stine will receive Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Horror Writers Association on May 10th as part of the Bram Stoker Awards Banquet at the World Horror Convention 2014 in Portland, Oregon.

Stephen Jones’ 125+ published books have been translated throughout the world. His work in the horror field has been widely recognized — he was guest of honor at the 2002 World Fantasy Con and the 2004 World Horror Con.

R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps series has sold over 300 million copies in the U.S. and been published in 32 languages. His other popular children’s book series include Fear Street, Mostly Ghostly, The Nightmare Room, and Rotten School. His anthology TV horror series, R.L. Stine’s The Haunting Hour, recently won an Emmy Award as Best Children’s Show.

HWA’s Lifetime Achievement Award is given “in acknowledgment of superior achievement not just in a single work but over an entire career.”

Winners must have exhibited a profound, positive impact on the fields of horror and dark fantasy, and be at least sixty years of age or have been published for a minimum of thirty-five years.

Past Lifetime Achievement Award winners include Stephen King, Anne Rice, Joyce Carol Oates, Ray Bradbury, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, Ramsey Campbell and Peter Straub. Recipients are chosen by a committee.

Lifetime Achievement Awards Given

Earl Kemp and Shelby Vick received Lifetime Achievement Awards at the Corflu Glitter banquet on April 22.

The Lifetime Achievement Awards “salute living fans for their excellent fanac over a long career in Fandom,” Arnie Katz explained in Glitter #61.

Convention chair Joyce Katz presented Kemp and Vick with framed certificates featuring art by Dan Steffan.

The Lifetime Achievement Awards were given for the first time in 2010, to Ted White and Art Widner.

A judging committee selects the winners from among nominations submitted by fans. The committee is made up of the two most recent Corflu chairs, the current Fan Achievement Awards Administrator, and any past Lifetime Achievement Award recipients who want to participate.