<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=47PBeJ_0wBHFHfX00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=47PBeJ_0wBHFHfX00" width="760" height="544" ></figure>Anna Friz, an associate professor of Film and Digital Media, has been raking in awards and honors. The multi-disciplinary artist who took a sabbatical last winter after receiving a Guggenheim fellowship, recently received the Karl Sczuka Prize for radio from SWR Germany.The German Award, which has been around for almost 70 years, gives 12,500 Euros for pieces that go beyond traditional forms of music. Works are often a form of hoerspiel, which roughly translates to “radio drama” but involves more musicality and experimentation. Friz describes hoerspiel as “a precursor to what we would now call radio art.”Born in Canada to a Danish mother, Friz grew up speaking Danish. She took German in high school saying, “German is actually not so difficult if you know Danish or any Scandinavian language.” She also went on an exchange to West Germany in the eighties. Friz's work has been performed, broadcast, or exhibited in more than 25 countries. She has had commissions with Austrian radio since the late 1990s, which paved the way for her to broadcast with German public radio as well as independent radio scenes.Friz has been working with ORF Kunstradio, the radio art program on the cultural channel of the national public radio of Austria that aired her award winning piece, since 1999. The Karl Sczuka prize accepts applicants from all over the world, this year people from 32 countries were considered. Friz’s win marks the first time ORF Kunstradio has ever won the prize.The piece, Revenant, Friz describes as more a little more quirky than previous pieces that have won, so she was pleasantly surprised to discover she was this year’s recipient. “Most public radio stations feel more nervous about commissioning experimental work,” says Friz. “They're just trying to figure out how to please the masses.”Revenant features two parts. The first, Outside, is based in part on a live performance Friz did in 2020 that was an exploration of the feelings of being both trapped and at risk during the period around the CZU wildfires and the ongoing pandemic isolation. Part two, Revenir, was inspired by the gophers tearing up Friz’s yard who were burrowing underground. “The piece is very much about literally what kind of body you have to metamorphosize into in order to be able to go to down into the underworld and visit the dead,” says Friz. “The piece seeks a visitation with a lost loved one.”Other awards and honors Friz has received include a Rydell Visual Arts Fellowship (2022) and a Hellman Fellow (2018). She received 2nd place in the Prix Palma Ars Acoustica 2014, was winner of a Phonurgia Nova residency award for GRM/INA studio in Paris, France in 2019 and was a finalist for the Phonurgia Nova Sound Art Prize in 2017. In 2011 she was nominated for a Dora Mavor Moore award (Toronto) and the Betty Mitchell award (Calgary) for excellence in composition and sound design for theater. Friz also recently returned from a trip to La Paz, Bolivia where her work was being played at the Sonandes Festival.</div></body>

Mountain View, CA

NewsBreak

UC Santa Cruz professor Anna Friz wins international prize in radio

Anna Friz, an associate professor of Film and Digital Media, has been raking in awards and honors. The multi-disciplinary artist who took a sabbatical last winter after receiving a Guggenheim fellowship, recently received the Karl Sczuka Prize for radio from SWR Germany. The German Award, which has been around for...