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The Eastern Eye celebrated their third Arts, Culture & Theatre Awards (ACTAs) on Friday 22 June with a ceremony at the May Fair hotel in central London, with big wins from Anoushka Shankar, Ayesha Hazarika and Anita Rani. George Alagiah was awarded the Eastern Eye Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Arts at the end of the evening.

The ACTAs were created by the Asian Media Group (AMG), publishers of the Eastern Eye, with the aim to recognise exceptional achievement in a wide range of fields including literature, film, television, theatre, poetry, music, photography, dance, and the visual arts.

AMG believes that diversity in arts enriches people’s lives and helps build a stronger and more cohesive multi-cultural Britain. South Asian arts and culture have become an integral part of British society for over a hundred years with Asian playwrights, performers, musicians, and dancers often collaborating with mainstream artists.

The Arts Council supported the Emerging Artist award for a second year, with Simon Mellor, Deputy CEO of Arts Council England, Arts and Culture, presenting the award.

The nominees for the Emerging Artist award were:

• Mahtab Hussain for You Get Me?
• Reece Bahia for Thriller Live
• Suman Kaur for her artistic depictions of Asian women and Sikh soldiers during World War One

There could only be one winner, and the award went to Reece Bahia for Thriller Live, currently performing in the West End.

Reece Bahia is a pop/RnB singer, songwriter and actor from Coventry, West Midlands. The young artist released his debut EP – Addicted in April 2016, an eclectic mix of pop, RnB and dance tracks He is classically trained (vocal) and also trained at Guildford School of Acting in Musical Theatre. In 2012, Reece won Coventry’s ‘Young Entertainer of the Year’ award. This achievement led to performances on main stages at Godiva Festival (Coventry) and Wychwood Festival (Cheltenham). Reece’s theatre credits include the role of young Michael Jackson in Got To Be Michael (Cambridge Corn Exchange), Buddy Holly Rock 'n' Roll Extravaganza (Belgrade Theatre), Sandra Godley's Sounds of the 60's, 70's and 80's (Belgrade Theatre).

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