87R25288 JGH-D
By: King of Hemphill H.R. No. 1220
R E S O L U T I O N
WHEREAS, The Texas Commission on the Arts has announced the
2021 appointments for the positions of State Poet Laureate,
State Musician, State Two-Dimensional Artist, and State
Three-Dimensional Artist; and
WHEREAS, The state's highest accolade for excellence in the
arts, designation as a Texas State Artist is conferred on those
individuals who represent the best of our rich and diverse artistic
community and who inspire others through their unique creative
expression; and
WHEREAS, Cyrus Cassells, the 2021 State Poet Laureate, is the
author of eight volumes of poetry, including The Gospel According
to Wild Indigo, which was a finalist for the NAACP Image Award and
the Balcones Prize, as well as More Than Watchmen at Daybreak and
the forthcoming The World That the Shooter Left Us; his translation
of Still Life with Children: Selected Poems of Francesc Parcerisas
won the Soeurette Diehl Fraser Award from the Texas Institute of
Letters, and his other honors include a Lambda Literary Award, a
Lannan Literary Award, two grants from the National Endowment for
the Arts, a Pushcart Prize, and a William Carlos Williams Award;
moreover, he was named a National Poetry Series winner; he is a
professor of English at Texas State University; and
WHEREAS, The 2021 Texas State Musician is Leon Bridges, whose
first album, Coming Home, debuted at number six on the Billboard
charts in 2015 and went on to be certified as a gold record; his
critically acclaimed second album, Good Thing, was released in May
2018; he has written and performed songs with such artists as
Macklemore, Ryan Lewis, Nick Waterhouse, Kacey Musgraves, Lecrae,
and Gary Clark Jr., and he has performed at the White House, the
Library of Congress, and other venues around the world; a four-time
Grammy nominee, he won for Best Traditional R&B Performance for his
song "Bet Ain't Worth the Hand"; and
WHEREAS, The unique work of Annette Lawrence, the 2021 State
Two-Dimensional Artist, turns the ordinary data of everyday life
into drawings, objects, and installations, and her pieces are
included in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the
Dallas Museum of Art, the Rachofsky Collection, Artpace San
Antonio, and the Blanton Museum of Art in Austin, among others; her
work appeared in the 1997 Biennial at the Whitney Museum of American
Art, and she is the recipient of a MacDowell Fellowship, the
Moss/Chumley Award from the Meadows Museum, and the Otis and Velma
Davis Dozier Travel Grant from the Dallas Museum of Art; she
recently retired as a professor of studio art at the University of
North Texas, and in August 2021, she will begin a visiting faculty
position at Bennington College in Vermont; and
WHEREAS, Jennifer Ling Datchuk, the 2021 State
Three-Dimensional Artist, was born in Ohio and raised in Brooklyn;
trained in ceramics, she utilizes materials often associated with
traditional women's work, such as porcelain, hair, and textiles;
she earned her bachelor of fine arts degree at Kent State University
and her master of fine arts degree from the University of
Massachusetts Dartmouth, and she has participated in residencies in
Germany, China, the Netherlands, and San Antonio; she received the
2017 Emerging Voices Award from the American Craft Council and was
named a United States Artists Fellow in Craft in 2020; she is an
assistant professor of art at Texas State University and maintains
a studio in San Antonio; and
WHEREAS, The artists who have been selected to hold these
prestigious posts have all greatly contributed to the vibrant
cultural life of the Lone Star State, and Texas is indeed fortunate
to be home to these talented individuals; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 87th Texas
Legislature hereby congratulate the 2021 Texas Commission on the
Arts honorees and extend to them sincere best wishes for continued
fulfillment in their creative endeavors.