At next year’s Sundance Film Festival, beloved late founder Robert Redford’s presence will be felt everywhere. Last month, the festival announced it would offer a bevy of events honoring its longtime home, as well as Redford. The late actor died in September at the age of 89. He had made Park City the festival’s home, having become a Utah resident starting in the late 1960s.
The 2026 festivities will also include a special take on the fest’s annual fundraiser, Celebrating Sundance Institute, this year stylized as “A Tribute to Founder Robert Redford.” The event will take place on Friday, January 23, 2026, at the Grand Hyatt Deer Valley in Utah. The evening “will honor Sundance Institute’s Founder, Robert Redford — his legacy, vision, and enduring mission to support independent storytellers,” and it will also see the establishment of the inaugural Robert Redford Luminary Award.
That new award will be presented to the multi-hyphenates Ed Harris and Gyula Gazdag, “two artists deeply dedicated to the Sundance Institute labs and committed to elevating bold storytellers.”
Per today’s press release, the award “recognizes 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 and Gazdag will be acknowledged for their decades-long contributions as creative advisors for the Sundance Institute Directors Lab, where they offer guidance to artists as they develop and refine their projects and skills as writers and directors in a nurturing, immersive environment. They will be honored for their dedication to Robert Redford’s vision of elevating new voices, championing independent storytelling, and upholding that artistic endeavor for years to come.”
“This will be a profoundly meaningful year for Sundance Institute as we honor our Founder, Robert Redford. This special evening supports the mission that he built this organization upon,” said Ebs Burnough, Sundance Institute Board Chair, in an official statement. “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 are immensely honored to recognize the legacy of Robert Redford through this annual event,” added Amanda Kelso, Acting CEO of Sundance Institute. “We are pleased to introduce the Robert Redford Luminary Award to Ed Harris and Gyula Gazdag, who have played crucial roles in the Sundance Institute labs for over two decades and strongly exemplify the mission that Mr. Redford set for the organization. By dedicating their time to mentoring artists and collaborating with the fellows who have come through the labs, they have been influential in the development of generations of filmmakers.”
Harris has been a creative advisor for the Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs since 2002. “My association with Sundance Institute has primarily been with the Directors Lab,” said Harris. “I’ve fortunately been asked to take part in the lab as an advisor for the past 19 years. Those weeks have been at the top of the list of the most rewarding, fulfilling, invaluable experiences of my life.”
Gazdag has been a creative advisor for the Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs since 1994 and artistic director for the Directors Lab since 1997. “The Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs became my second home throughout the years, where everything is about nurturing independent art, and that is second nature to every person who is part of it,” said Gazdag. “It has provided me with fresh air, inspiration, camaraderie, moral support, and love. I always felt that making an effort to reciprocate all of that results in a fruitful process of free creation. Becoming part of the Sundance Institute family is one of the best things that ever happened to me.”
The 2026 Sundance Film Festival, the last to be held in Park City, will take place from January 22 – February 1, 2026, in person in Park City and Salt Lake City, Utah, with the at-home program available online from January 29–February 1, 2026, for audiences across the country.
