: Don: I remember a couple of conversations with Art about what he was looking for. Basically he wanted to see character development and some kind of progression or story with a beginning, middle, and end. He wanted to see the character connect with the audience. Art was willing to be amazed by insanely difficult technical juggling, but I don't think he found it particularly interesting. : : The individual prop and the numbers competitions should be enough to satisfy the technical wizards. Perhaps it is time to rebalance the championships to a 50/50 mix between technique and artistic presentation. The founder's award could be morphed into an artistic merit award to encourage presentation skills. : DAVE: Son of a gun! Something else we 100% agree on. I think the majority of professional jugglers make a living by doing an entertaining show highlighting juggling and not by just doing technical juggling. Throwing up a bunch of objects without any presentation or relating to the audience, while amazing, is pretty boring after the first twenty seconds or so. : Also, the IJA could promote "our" champion. Maybe have some appearances lined up before we "crown" the champion by calling the morning shows, day time talk shows, night time shows, half time sporting event shows, concerts, etc. It would help promote juggling in general, the IJA, and it might keep an IJA Champion from having to flip burgers or do low level juggling gigs to make a living. : Dave, a juggler Art retired the award when he found that there were no acts which merited the award. He might have given it this year to Steven Ragatz. I did not see the Bix show so I don't know about that act. Here are Art's criteria as I recall them: The act must tell a story. It must move you. It must take you on an emotional journey and let you down gently at the end. There must be costuming, attention to detail, care for the audience, respect for the props and the space. There must be a beginning, a middle, and an end. There must be no drops. Or if there are any drops they must be covered up with drop lines or moves which make the audience say, "I wonder if he dropped it on purpose." Frankly it was those criteria that we used in putting together Dorothy's two acts, her swing dance routine in Montreal and her Hawaiian number in Madison. That was the motivation behind our family act, "The Finnigan Family Hits the Beach." I felt the only award wort ever striving for was the Founders Trophy, and I believe we should revive it.