Murfreesboro, TN — Thursday, October 29 is the last opportunity to see the Laureate Display at the Rotunda at City Hall.

2020 marks the third year of the Murfreesboro Laureate program. Poet Laureate Amie Whittemore, Photographer Laureate Tommy Womack and Painter Laureate Dawna Magliacano were selected among a talented pool of artists to represent the city of Murfreesboro. The Rotunda show provides the perfect opportunity to see their art on display. 2020 has been a historic year marked with drastic changes for the community. The artists’ work reveals the year in a way unlike past Laureate shows.

The Murfreesboro Cultural Arts Laureate Program is a notable honor for local artists, providing recipients with further opportunities to educate, advocate, and represent the community through their own creative initiatives. Laureates serve for one year with an optional one-year renewal.

This year’s Painter Laureate Dawna Kinne Magliacano is a multi-discipline artist who considers herself a visual storyteller and art adventurer. "I am in love with exploring art processes and then combining those processes to tell a story." From traditional portraiture and painting to sculpting, her work leans toward the whimsical and enchanting with often amusing story lines and lots of color.

Magliacano has been an artist for over 45 years, but officially and full-time for the past twelve years. Her work has earned a number of accolades and she has been featured in multiple publications including two volumes of the North Light Publications titled Incite: The Best of Mixed Media. Her work is collected internationally.

Photographer Laureate Tommy Womack is a freelance Website designer. As he grew his business, he realized that a website needs attractive imagery, eye catching photographs, video and animation. This realization led him to pursue photography classes and spurned a new passion.

His photography and web design business introduced him to 360 virtual imaging. This new way of capturing life has grown into a virtual library featuring local events and places. Womack’s photography features a mixture of local landscapes and current events. 

Poet Laureate Amie Whittemore is the author of the poetry collection Glass Harvest (Autumn House Press). Her poems have won multiple awards, including a Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Prize, and her poems and prose have appeared in The Gettysburg Review, Nashville Review, Smartish Pace, Pleiades, and elsewhere. She is the Reviews Editor for Southern Indiana Review and teaches English at Middle Tennessee State University.

The City of Murfreesboro will recognize a Visual Arts Laureate and a Performing Arts Laureate in January 2021. Amie Whittemore will serve another year as Poet Laureate. Submissions are currently being accepted for the 2021 Laureates at culturalartsmurfreesboro.submittable.com. 2021 Laureates will be announced in January.

Murfreesboro Parks and Recreation Department is dedicated to providing vibrant public spaces and inclusive programs delivered with visionary leadership and caring staff that engage the individual and strengthen the quality of life of our community.