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Critic's choice: Microaudiotellarevolution, by Christopher Blay, Gallery 414

Is Chris Blay the only artist in town with any balls? As fantastic as some 817 painters and sculptors are, they're still painting and sculpting. Blay is re-imagining what art can be and do, and Microaudiotellarevolution has to go down as his most ambitious project yet. A haunting multimedia exhibit inspired by the 1980 coup in Liberia, Microaudiotellarevolution interrogated the mediatization of reality by confronting the viewer with antiquated media (ancient microfilm machines, ancient tape recorders, ancient overhead projectors), a veritable Wall of Babel, and imagery (army men, soldiers, dictators) lifted from the war-torn Third World. As we said in a Feb. 18 review, "The inert yet dynamic space Blay has created has the aloofness of a news report from the gory frontlines and the quiet intimacy of a bedtime story written by David Lynch, Jim Morrison, and Colonel Kurtz."

Visual Artist

Readers' choice: J.T. Grant

Critic's choice: Jason Reynaga

Sparklingly colored and full of references to video games and superheroes, Reynaga's prints may be the visual equivalent of bubblegum, but there's no denying their easy charm. The TCU alum and art department chair at Wade College in Dallas, Reynaga has been seen exhibiting with fellow rabble-rousers Omar Hernandez, Greg Mansur, and Eddy Rawlinson.

Art Gallery

Readers' choice: Artspace 111, 111 Hampton St, FW

Critic's choice: Gallery 414, 414 Templeton Dr, FW

From a pure programming perspective, Gallery 414, a past Best Of winner, had an excellent past 12 months, exhibiting a new, urgent, political side that missed a lot but that was warranted during the year of the most important presidential election of the modern era.

Museum Art Show of Last 12 Months

Readers' choice: Butchers, Dragons, Gods & Skeletons, by Philip Haas, Kimbell Art Museum

Critic's choice: Butchers, Dragons, Gods & Skeletons

Probably the best museum show in Fort Worth since the Amon Carter Museum commissioned Richard Avedon's In the American West, lo, these 25-plus years ago, Butchers, commissioned by and installed in the Kimbell, is a series of short films inspired by select pieces in the museum's permanent collection that truly bring the pieces to life. Looking at, say, James Ensor's "Skeletons Warming Themselves" is one thing. Watching it is another.

Performing Arts Organization

Readers' choice: Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra

Critic's choice: Van Cliburn Foundation

Given the great success that the Cliburn had hosting the 13th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition this past summer, it had to be them. Despite a depressed economy (which no doubt prevented some out-of-town fans from traveling to Fort Worth) and media organizations with fewer resources to devote to covering the competition, the buzz around this quadrennial event was stronger than ever, thanks to a strong field of competitors and the way the peerless staff handled this gigantic series of logistical challenges without a hitch.

Production Staged by a Local Theater

Readers' choice: The Prophet, by Hip Pocket Theatre

Critic's choice: dark play or stories for boys, by Amphibian Productions

Most theater communities could use fewer Elizabethan romps and more bracing, imaginative, contemporary-to-the-moment plays like Carlos Murillo's dark play or stories for boys, an almost unbelievable (yet entirely true) internet-era tale of an impostor, a victim, a twisted seduction, and an attempted murder that made British courtroom history. Director JV Mercanti found high theatrical drama in the alternative digital universe of online social networking.

Theater Troupe

Readers' choice: Stage West

Critic's choice: Trinity Shakespeare Festival at TCU

TCU's Trinity Shakespeare Festival relieved an unquestionable Cowtown drought -- seven years without Summer Willie -- and provided top-quality performances, excellent production values, and a necessary desire to re-invigorate the iconic playwright with sensitive and intelligent readings of his texts.

Classical Music Performance (Cliburn Competition)

Critic's choice: Andrea Lam, semifinals

The Australian pianist didn't make the final round of the Cliburn, but she was dazzling in all phases of her one-hour semifinal recital. She played a sparkling version of a Haydn sonata, turned Stravinsky's Four Études and Ginastera's Danzas Criollas ("Creole Dances") into hair-raising showpieces, and was the only contestant who caught the American idiom of Mason Bates' White Lies for Lomax. The real glory, though, was her jewel-like set of Brahms' late pieces that seemed to still the air with their intimate beauty.

Book By Texas Author Published in Last 12 Months

Readers' choice: Jon Bonnell's Fine Texas Cuisine, by Jon Bonnell

Critic's choice: Go Down Together: The True, Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde, by Jeff Guinn

The lives and deaths of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow have lost much of their rich, juicy Texas folklore quality over the decades since Arthur Penn's bowdlerized 1967 movie version. Former Fort Worth Star-Telegram staffer Guinn restored the fascination with his meticulously detailed, heartbreaking, and sometimes gruesome retelling of the North Texas couple's mostly amateurish criminal antics.

Show at Bass Hall in Last 12 Months

Readers' choice: Cleopatra, by Texas Ballet Theater

Critic's choice: La Cenerentola, by Fort Worth Opera

That's Cinderella to you and me. Rossini's comic take on the story was the hit of Fort Worth Opera's summer festival. Headlined by star-in-the-making Isabel Leonard, the show featured formidable singing from the lead and supporting cast and overflowed with crackling, inventive comic business that left the Bass Hall crowd on its feet clamoring for more. And FWO's Carmen wasn't far behind.

Local Filmmaker

Readers' choice: James Johnston

Critic's choice: Andrew Disney

Distantly related to the famous Disneys, the 23-year-old Fort Worth native turned heads at the 2007 Lone Star International Film Festival with his short film, Frank's Last Shot. Then he caught the filmmaking world's attention by shooting his trailer for Searching for Sonny on a still camera. His technological breakthrough has raised the possibility that low-budget filmmakers can make movies that look as good as Hollywood's stuff.