Two of four Canadians to win the 2016 Artist of Choice award from the Kevin Spacey Foundation are from Vancouver.

The KSF Artist of Choice award offers a grant of $10,000, along with mentorship and professional guidance, for artists and companies working in theatre, dance, film, or musicals. Each year, 12 recipients are chosen, four each from the U.K., the U.S. , and Canada.

Filmmaker Mary Galloway and her production company Bright Shadow Productions won the award for her forthcoming short film "Unintentional Mother".

The film, set in the 1970s, explores the dilemma of a young aboriginal nanny forced to choose between running away from her abusive father or remaining as a loyal nanny.

Galloway, who is from Qualicum Beach and is Coast Salish, previously wrote, produced, and starred in the 2016 short film "Ariel Unraveling", which received BravoFACT and Creative BC awards.

Galloway graduated from Vancouver's New Image College's acting program and her acting credits include the TV series Supernatural and the two-spirit feature film Fire Song.

She also received the 2016 Vancouver Women in Film and Television Spotlight Award for best newcomer.

Meanwhile, Vancouver-based Aeriosa Company, and artistic director and choreographer Julia Taffe, received the Artist of Choice award for Pseudotsuga—Earth to Sky, a collaborative performance involving vertical dancers, musicians, and old-growth trees in Stanley Park in Vancouver.

The piece is part of a larger project to acknowledge the park as Coast Salish territory that will reunite Aeriosa with Spakwus Slulem Eagle Song Dancers in 2017.

Aeriosa's aerial dances are inspired by rock climbing, and past performances have taken place in spaces such as the rock cliffs of the Stawamus Chief, the treetops of UBC Botanical Garden, and the exterior wall of the Vancouver Public Library's central branch.

The other two Canadian recipients of the KSF award are Victoria's Atomic Vaudeville for Action Revue: Feel the Fight, a musical project that will explore masculinity in the boxing ring, and Toronto theatre company Red Light District for Lulu, which will delve what makes people fear and seek to control female sexuality.