Juzo Itami Award | |
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Awarded for | Excellence in literary and visual expression |
Location | Itami Juzo Museum Matsuyama, Ehime, Japan[1] |
Presented by | ITM Itami Memorial Foundation |
First awarded | 2009 |
Currently held by | Kōki Mitani |
Website | Official website |
The Juzo Itami Award (伊丹十三賞, Itami Jūzō Shō) honors achievement and outstanding talent in any of the myriad fields in which its namesake Juzo Itami worked, including essay writing, non-fiction literature, translation, film editing and directing, cooking, television, TV commercials, acting, illustration, and graphic design. The prize, worth ¥1 million, is presented annually by the ITM Itami Memorial Foundation in collaboration with Itami Productions.
The selection committee comprises film director Masayuki Suo, architect Yoshifumi Nakamura , essayist Yoko Hiramatsu , and illustrator Shinbo Minami .[1]
The Juzo Itami Award was established in March 2009, twelve years after Itami's death, with the help of his wife, Nobuko Miyamoto.[2] Originally focusing on excellence in literary expression in odd-numbered years and visual expression in even-numbered years, its two categories were unified and its cadence changed to yearly in 2011.
In 2013, journalist Akira Ikegami donated his entire monetary award to the World Food Programme.[3]