2020 Dorothy Woodend and Paloma Pacheco

Dorothy Woodend, the culture editor for the on-line news magazine The Tyee, was the winner of the 2020 Max Wyman Award in Critical Writing. A mentorship prize, in the form of a residency at the Banff Centre for Art and Creativity, recognizing an emerging critical writer chosen by the award winner, was won by Paloma Pacheco, a Vancouver-based freelance writer and a graduate student at UBC’s School of Journalism, Writing and Media.

Dorothy Woodend, 2020 Recipient

“Much has been made in recent years of the so-called death of criticism at the hands of social media,” said Yosef Wosk. “But in a time of unprecedented social upheaval, informed discussion of the imagined alternatives presented by our artists becomes a vital part of our forward journey. I am delighted that this prize is going to a writer of such insight, empathy and courage.” “The Banff Centre is delighted to be part of this important initiative,” said Centre Vice-President of Arts and Leadership Howard Jang. “We see the mentorship as a perfect fit with our central aim to unleash creative potential through cross-disciplinary learning.”

Dorothy Woodend is the culture editor for The Tyee. She maintains an active freelance writing career, contributing to newspapers and magazines across Canada and the U.S., including The Globe & Mail, the Vancouver Sun, Elle Canada, Chatelaine, as well as a number of

literary anthologies. She has twice been awarded the Silver Medal for Best Column from the Digital Publishing Awards and was also nominated this year for a National Magazine Award for Best Column for her work with The Tyee.

Paloma Pacheco, mentorship prize winner, 2020

Born in Vancouver and raised in the Kootenays, she holds degrees in English from Simon Fraser University and Film Animation from Emily Carr University. In 1998, she co-founded Eponymous Inc., with Jim Smith and Bernard Sauvé, working with a number of Vancouver artists and organizations, among them The Holy Body Tattoo, Vancouver New Music, Kidd Pivot and Wen Wei Dance.

She was the associate editor and art director for Hodgepog Books, an award-winning children’s press from 1998 to 2001, and from 2005 to 2010 was the associate editor for the Vancouver International Film Festival, helping to produce the annual festival program. She has worked with the Whistler Film Festival, the National Film Board of Canada and the Available Light Festival. In 2008 she joined the board of the DOXA Documentary Film Festival in Vancouver and in 2010 became its director of programming. She was the acting-festival director from 2017 to 2018 and is currently the senior festival advisor. In 2004, Dorothy became The Tyee’s film critic, and became culture editor in 2019. She is a member of the Broadcast Film Critics Association, the Vancouver Film Critics Circle and the Alliance of Women Film Journalists.