Sundance Robert Redford Luminary Award for Ed Harris, Gyula Gazdag

The Sundance Institute has created the Robert Redford Luminary Award in honour of its late founder, and named Ed Harris and Gyula Gazdag as the first recipients. 

The awards will be presented during the 2026 version of the Institute’s annual fundraiser, Celebrating Sundance Institute: A Tribute to Founder Robert Redford, set for January 23, at the start of the 2026 Sundance festival’s January 22-February 1 run in Park City.

The evening will honour Redford’s “legacy, vision, and enduring mission to support independent storytellers,” said the Institute. 

The Robert Redford Luminary Award, said the non-profit, “recognises and celebrates individuals who have, in a visionary way, used their resources, insights, and reach to create possibility where there wasn’t, thus doing their part to make the world a better place.” 

Harris, a four-time Oscar nominee who has appeared in films including The Hours, The Truman Show and Pollock (which he also directed), has been a creative advisor for the Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs since 2002. 

Gazdag, a screenwriter, film and theatre director, has been a creative advisor for the Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs since 1994 and artistic director for the Directors Lab since 1997. 

Ebs Burnough, Sundance Institute Board Chair, commented: “This will be a profoundly meaningful year for Sundance Institute as we honour our founder, Robert Redford. This special evening supports the mission that he built this organisation upon. This annual event enables the nonprofit Institute to continue to launch and uplift the work of independent artists from all over the world through labs, grants, and public programs. We look forward to our guests joining us in honouring and celebrating the vision that we will carry forward.”

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