The Byron Kennedy Award was established in 1984 by the Australian Film Institute

Australian Film Institute

The Australian Film Institute was founded in 1958 as a non-profit organisation devoted to developing an active film culture in Australia and fostering engagement between the general public and the Australian film industry...

 in honour of the late film producer Byron Kennedy

Byron Kennedy

Byron Eric Kennedy Born Melbourne was an Australian film producer best known for the Mad Max series of films....

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"This is an accolade usually bestowed upon someone early in their career, whose quality of work is marked by their relentless pursuit of excellence."

It is accompanied by a A$

Australian dollar

The Australian dollar is the currency of the Commonwealth of Australia, including Christmas Island, Cocos Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru and Tuvalu...

10,000 cash prize sponsored by Kennedy Miller, Warner Brothers, Village Roadshow, Greater Union, Cinemedia and Steven Spielberg

Steven Spielberg

Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...

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Recipients

• 1984 Roger Savage
• 1985 Andrew Pike
• 1986 Nadia Tass and David Parker
• 1987 Martha Ansara
• 1988 George Ogilvie
  George Ogilvie
  George Ogilvie is an Australian actor and film director. He was born in Goulburn, New South Wales in 1931. He directed Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome with George Miller.He was awarded the A.M...
  
  
• 1989 Jane Campion
  Jane Campion
  Jane Campion is a filmmaker and screenwriter. She is one of the most internationally successful New Zealand directors, although most of her work has been made in or financed by other countries, principally Australia – where she now lives – and the United States...
  
  
• 1990 Dennis O'Rourke
• 1991 John Duigan
• 1992 Robin Anderson & Bob Connolly
• 1993 Adrian Martin, Matt Butler, Evonne Chesson and Gary Warner
• 1994 John Hargreaves
  John Hargreaves (Australian actor)
  John Hargreaves was an Australian actor. He won three Australian Film Institute Awards and was nominated six times.-Background:...
  
  
• 1995 Jill Bilcock
• 1996 Laura Jones
• 1997 John Polson
  John Polson
  John Polson is an Australian actor, director and founder of Tropfest. In February 2001, Polson attended the 12th Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival in Hokkaidō, Japan where his film Siam Sunset won the Minami Toshiko Award...
  
  
• 1998 Alison Barrett, Arthur Cambridge,
• 1999 Baz Luhrmann
  Baz Luhrmann
  Mark Anthony "Baz" Luhrmann is an Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for The Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes his films Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!...
  
   and Catherine Martin
  Catherine Martin
  Catherine Martin is an Australian costume designer, production designer, set designer, and film producer.-Biography:Catherine Martin went to school at North Sydney Girls High School...
  
  
• 2000
  • Popcorn Taxi
    Popcorn Taxi
    Popcorn Taxi is an Australian independent non-competitive film festival that presents regular screening of local and international film and television works. The unique nature of each screening is that the events provide patrons with the opportunity to discuss the film with the filmmaker...
    
     – an Australian independent film festival
    Film festival
    A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theaters or screening venues, usually in a single locality. More and more often film festivals show part of their films to the public by adding outdoor movie screenings...
    
     founded by Matt Wheeldon and Gary Doust
  • Independent Filmmakers Magazine founded by Stephen Jenner and David Barda
• 2001 Ian David
• 2002 Rachel Perkins
  Rachel Perkins
  Rachel Perkins is a film and television director, film and television producer and a writer. She is known for her films Bran Nue Dae, Radiance and One Night the Moon. Perkins is an Arrernte woman from Central Australia, who was raised in Canberra by parents Eileen and Charles Perkins...
  
  
• 2003 Dion Beebe
• 2004 John Clarke
  John Clarke (satirist)
  John Morrison Clarke is a New Zealand-born Australian comedian, writer, and satirist. He was born in Palmerston North, New Zealand, and has lived in Australia since the late 1970s...
  
  
• 2005 Chris Kennedy
• 2006 Rolf de Heer
  Rolf de Heer
  Rolf de Heer is a Dutch film director, writer and producer living in Australia. De Heer was born in Heemskerk in The Netherlands but migrated to Sydney when he was eight years old. He attended the Australian Film Television and Radio School in Sydney. His company is called Vertigo Productions and...
  
  
• 2007 Curtis Levy
• 2008 Chris Lilley
  Chris Lilley (comedian)
  -External links:****...
  
  
• 2010 Animal Logic
  Animal Logic
  Animal Logic is an Australian digital visual effects company based at Fox Studios in Sydney, Australia and Santa Monica, California. Established in 1991, Animal Logic's core business has traditionally been the design and production of high-end visual effects for commercials and television programs,...
  
   – an Australian digital visual effects
  Visual effects
  Visual effects are the various processes by which imagery is created and/or manipulated outside the context of a live action shoot. Visual effects involve the integration of live-action footage and generated imagery to create environments which look realistic, but would be dangerous, costly, or...
  
  company fronded by Zareh Nalbandian