2006 Index of Winners

In the Owly series of graphic novels published by Marietta’s Top Shelf Productions, Lilburn native ANDY RUNTON gives “wholesome” a good name through the black-and-white, family-friendly adventures of a young owl and his nature-loving pals. Despite the simple stories, Runton’s work achieves surprising emotional depth and, given the lack of dialogue, narrative sophistication. Runton’s Owly even makes “cute” kind of cool, without being kitschy. ''www.andyrunton.com .
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Local artist and craft fan Garth Johnson has one of the most impressive artsy-craft-centric websites going, period, at www.EXTREMECRAFT.COM. Its visual panache is matched by erudite, ballsy, often blissfully obscene writing and intelligent connections forged between technology, lowbrow, handicraft and conceptual art. Extreme Craft should be a daily destination on every smarty-pants hipster’s surf.
www.extremecraft.com.

Though we’re slightly concerned that they may have emboldened our enemies, we loved Brooks & Company Dance’s ominous take on unquestioning allegiance in THE LOTTERY. Choreographer Joanna Brooks reworked a canonical Stravinsky/Nijinsky ballet, Le Sacre du Printemps, thrusting Nijinsky’s angular, jolting choreography into the plot of Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery,” giving new meaning to the original ballet’s ritual sacrifice.
404-454-1032. www.brooksandcompanydance.com.

The short stories of Jack Pendarvis find security guards watching over a shock jock buried alive, an unemployed man spying on sinister squirrels, and a very, very bad writer attempting to write the history of America. In THE MYSTERIOUS SECRET OF THE VALUABLE TREASURE, Pendarvis’ words are as wild and possessed by the same mad genius as his characters.
$21. MacAdam/Cage. 187 pages.

Atlanta author Joshilyn Jackson puts a new twist on the family feud in BETWEEN, GEORGIA, in which the biological daughter of one family is raised by that family’s sworn enemies. As an adult, only she can keep the two families from killing one another. No pressure. Set in a fictionalized version of the real town of Between, the novel adeptly mixes cold-blooded creepiness with lyric love and loyalty.
$22.99. Warner Books. 304 pages.

With his quick wit and smooth delivery, DREW THOMAS has become a force in Atlanta’s comedy scene. Aside from hosting the weekly open-mic night at the Twisted Taco on Tuesdays and regularly performing at other venues across the city, Thomas recently headlined at the Punchline. He’s toured nationally to perform with the likes of Bill Bellamy, Aries Spears, D.L. Hughley, Bill Burr and Ron White. And, in the fall, he will be appearing on Robert Townsend’s “Partners in Crime” on the Black Family Channel.
''www.myspace.com/bigdrewthomas
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Dancers are plenty familiar with people not eating, but this time they danced to fill others’ tummies. Pamela Dionne’s CityDance Ensemble brought together nine Atlanta companies for MOVING FORWARD, a dance festival to benefit Second Harvest’s efforts to feed the survivors of Hurricane Katrina. It was a great cause and a great show, too.
524 Plasters Ave. 404-877-0005. <a href="http://"www.studiodionne.com">www.studiodionne.com.

Winner of this year’s prestigious Santa Fe Prize for Photography, SHEILA PREE-BRIGHT is an enormously talented Atlanta Contemporary Art Center studio artist. She has created a host of revealing, stereotype-busting work examining the phenomena of the hip-hop fashion accessory of grills, the black middle class and black female sexuality, and she promises more fascinating peeks into contemporary identity to come.
www.sheilapreebright.com.