Big Brain Award Winners: From 150 Nominations to 15 Finalists, Here Are the Six Winners

Saturday night, Phoenix New Times celebrated the paper's 40th anniversary and honored the finalists and winners of the first-ever Big Brain Awards. Six winners — including one in a surprise wild card category, culinary arts — were announced:

Jonathan McNamara

Chatting up the winners.

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More About

• Phoenix (Arizona)
• Marcelino Quinonez
• Spencer Hibert
• Food and Cooking
• Culinary Arts

Seesaw Designs, Design

Co-owned by Angela Hardison, Raquel Raney and Lindsay Tingstrom, this burgeoning Scottsdale-based graphic design firm has branched out into letterpress, and the Seesaw threesome are definitely tastemakers of the highest order.

CenPho.TV, Online Media

Dave Brookhouser and Jacqui Johnson film a weekly five-minute podcast about things to do around Phoenix. It took a tragedy — their equipment was stolen from their downtown Phoenix apartment — for them to learn of their fans, who raised money to keep CenPho.TV in production.

Marcelino Quiñonez, Performing Arts

As a Latino actor, Quiñonez has taken on both expected and unexpected roles — and excelled at all he's done.

Spencer Hibert, Visual Arts

You can buy Hibert's art on the toniest street in Scottsdale (Marshall Way, where he co-rents gallery space) or in vending machines around the world, in the form of the Miigii, his signature plastic (or resin) toy.

Saxon Richardson, Film

At 17, Richardson is already an accomplished filmmaker. His film "Send Greener Grass Uphill" was a standout in the Arizona State University short film festival earlier this year, and our judges loved it, as well.

Natalie Morris, Culinary Arts

Read about Morris in the accompanying piece on this page.