South Australian Ruby Awards

The South Australian Ruby Awards, also known as the Ruby Awards, are annual awards which recognise outstanding achievement in South Australia’s arts and culture sector. They were named in honour of arts champion Dame Ruby Litchfield .

History and description

The Ruby Awards were introduced in 2006 by the Government of South Australia, named in honour of the late arts patron Dame Ruby Litchfield. She was the first woman appointed to the Board of the Adelaide Festival Centre Trust, a founder member of Festival City Broadcasters, and a board member of numerous other organisations, including the Adelaide Festival of Arts, the South Australian Housing Trust and the Carclew Youth Performing Arts Centre.
The Awards were managed by Arts South Australia until 2018, when they were transferred to the Arts and Culture unit within the Department of the Premier and Cabinet.
Since the year of inception, they have grown in number from eight to twelve.

Winners

2006–2009

2010–2013

The Geoff Crowhurst Memorial Award was introduced in honour of actor and director Geoff Crowhurst.

2014–2017

2018–2023

The 2018 South Australian Ruby Award significantly reshaped the award categories, including individual categories names in honour of the late Kaurna elder Stephen Goldsmith and local arts icon Frank Ford, both of whom who died in the same year.

	2018 Finalists '	2019 Finalists '	2021 Finalists '	2023 Winners
	The Awards were held at the Queen's Theatre, Adelaide and the judging panel included eight key industry figures, including Heather Croall, Gavin Wanganeen and media personality Jane Doyle.	The 2019 Ruby Awards will be held at Queens Theatre on Friday 29 November. All winners receive a bespoke, ruby-coloured glasswork designed and made at the JamFactory, and a new prize for Premier's Award for Lifetime Achievement was established: a gold nameplate on a seat in the Festival Theatre. The People's Choice Award established in 2017 was not offered.
Outstanding Community Event or Project	-	-	-	Wild Dog, Jacob Boehme
Best Festival	Adelaide Festival 2018 Adelaide Fringe 2018 SALA Festival 2017 WOMADelaide 2018	Adelaide Festival 2019 AltFest 2019 SALA Festival 2018 OzAsia Festival 2018	Adelaide Film Festival	-
Best Work or Event Within a Festival	Hamlet – Adelaide Festival and Glyndebourne Festival Opera In the Club – State Theatre Company South Australia Waqt al-tagheer: Time of Change – ACE Open Place des Anges – WOMADelaide and Gratte Ciel	Counting and Cracking – Adelaide Festival Hotel Mumbai – Producer Julie Ryan and Director/Co-writer Anthony Maras John Mawurndjul: I am the old and the new – Art Gallery of South Australia The Beginning of Nature – Australian Dance Theatre Yabarra - Gathering of Light – Adelaide Fringe	Guttered, Restless Dance Theatre The Pulse, Gravity & Other Myths Clarice Beckett: The Present Moment, Art Gallery of South Australia The Boy Who Talked to Dogs, Slingsby Theatre Company and State Theatre Company South Australia in association with Adelaide Festival and Draiocht	Talk to Me, Danny and Michael Philippou, Adelaide Film Festival 2022
Best Work or Event Outside a Festival	Beep – Windmill Theatre Co Colours of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musée d'Orsay – Art Gallery of South Australia Impersonal Space – Company AT and Tutti Arts On the Terrace – Chamber Music Adelaide	Absence Embodied by Chiharu Shiota – Art Gallery of South Australia Amphibian – Windmill Theatre Co The Gods of Strangers – State Theatre Company The Young King National Tour – Slingsby Theatre Company	Decameron 2.0, State Theatre Company South Australia and ActNow Theatre Euphoria, Country Arts SA and State Theatre Company South Australia Seeing Through Darkness, Restless Dance Theatre	Beep and Mort – Series One, Windmill Pictures
Best Work, Event or Project for Young People	AREA 53 – D'Faces of Youth Arts Inc. Beep – Windmill Theatre Co Neo – Art Gallery of South Australia Ngarrindjeri Yanun – Carclew Youth Arts	Baba Yaga – Windmill Theatre Company DreamBig Festival 2019 – Adelaide Festival Centre Trust Drop Out – Directed and Devised by Alirio Zavarce and True North Youth Theatre Ensemble Neo – Art Gallery of South Australia	Creation Creation, Windmill Theatre Co Neo, Art Gallery of South Australia Zooom, Patch Theatre	the Boy & the Ball, Stephen Noonan
Best Regional or Community Event or Project	AREA 53 – D'Faces of Youth Arts Inc. Collectors/Collections: Waikerie Films – Waikerie District Historical Society and OSCA – Open Space Contemporary Arts Mi:Wi 3027 – Country Arts SA SCC Fringe 2018 – Art Engineers, Ashley Sierp and Southern Cross Care	Bush Classroom Initiative – South Australian Museum Creative Gathering – Ausdance SA In the Pines – James Harding and Gener8 Theatre Company Vietnam - One In, All In – Country Arts SA	'Guiding Light' Vietnamese Boat People Monument, RosellaBadios Collaborative Design The Heart Beat Club, Access2Arts Euphoria, Country Arts SA and State Theatre Company South Australia	Marungka Tjalatjunu , Derik Lynch and Matthew Thorne with Switch Productions
Award for Outstanding Contribution by an Organisation or Group	ActNow Theatre Stormfront Productions True North Youth Theatre Ensemble Vitalstatistix	Brink Productions Nexus Arts Restless Dance Theatre Zephyr Quartet	Slingsby Nexus Arts Gravity & Other Myths Closer Productions	The Mill Adelaide
Made in Adelaide Award	Baba Yaga – Windmill Theatre Co Backbone + A Simple Space – Gravity & Other Myths Intimate Space at Bleach* Festival – Restless Dance Theatre Things I Know to be True – State Theatre Company South Australia	Memorial Brisbane Festival and the Barbican – Brink Productions Out of Chaos – Gravity and Other Myths Rumpelstiltskin – Windmill Theatre Co and State Theatre Company Slingsby Goes Global 2018 - 19 touring – Slingsby Theatre Company The Spinners Edinburgh Fringe Festival and Edinburgh Showcase – Lina Limosani	-	-
Best Collaboration	-	-	Floods of Fire, Adelaide Symphony Orchestra with Brink Productions, Tutti Arts, Nexus Arts, Julian Ferraretto, Adam Page, Hilary Kleinig, Zhao Liang, Jakub Jankowski, Grayson Rotumah, Luke Harrald and Lab Adelaide The Boy Who Talked to Dogs, Slingsby Theatre Company and State Theatre Company South Australia in association with Adelaide Festival and Draiocht Decameron 2.0, State Theatre Company South Australia and ActNow Theatre	Adelaide Film Festival EXPAND Lab 2022, Adelaide Film Festival, Samstag Museum of Art, Art Gallery of South Australia, Illuminate Adelaide, The Balnaves Foundation.
Stevie Gadlabarti Goldsmith Memorial Award	Major Moogy Sumner	Nici Cumpston	Lee-Ann Tjunypa Buckskin	Natasha Wanganeen
Frank Ford Memorial Young Achiever Award	Nicholas Carter	Winner: Tilda Cobham-HerveyHighly Commended: Anton Andreacchio	Grace Coy	Alexander Flood
Geoff Crowhurst Memorial Award	Nick O’Connor, Director, Northern Sound System	Winner: Kunmanara Williams Highly Commended: Ann Newmarch	Nick Hughes	Tony Hannan
People's Choice Award	True North Youth Theatre Ensemble	-	-	-
Premier's Award for Lifetime Achievement	Alison Milyika Carroll, Indigenous artist and community leader at Ernabella/Pukatja	Paul Blackwell and David Gulpilil	Pat Rix and Garry Stewart	Diana Harris and Nigel Levings'

2024

	2024 Winners
Outstanding Community Event or Project	Papercuts Comics Festival 2023, Papercuts Comics Festival
Outstanding Regional Event or Project	Saltbush Country, Country Arts SA and Art Gallery of South Australia
Outstanding Work, Event or Project for Young People	Superluminal, Patch Theatre
Outstanding Work or Event Within a Festival	Private View, Restless Dance Theatre, Adelaide Festival 2024
Outstanding Work or Event Outside a Festival	The Dictionary of Lost Words, State Theatre Company of South Australia
Outstanding Collaboration	Blak Futures, Australian Dance Theatre, BlakDance, Adelaide Festival
Outstanding Contribution by an Organisation or Group	Adelaide Youth Orchestra
Geoff Crowhurst Memorial Award	Claire Wildish
Frank Ford Memorial Young Achiever Award	Lilla Berry
Stevie Gadlabarti Goldsmith Memorial Award	Gina Rings
Premier's Award for Lifetime Achievement	James Currie