SENATE RESOLUTION NO. 412
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 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 Senate of the State of Texas, 87th
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.
Seliger
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President of the Senate
I hereby certify that the
above Resolution was adopted by
the Senate on May 18, 2021.
________________________________
Secretary of the Senate
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Member, Texas Senate