Richardson Receives National Arts Advocacy Honor

Retired University of Wyoming Senior Lecturer Bruce Richardson has been named winner of the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies’ (NASAA) 2016 Distinguished Public Service Award.

Richardson, whose career spanned more than 30 years teaching English courses at UW-Casper, will received the award Sept. 17 during NASAA’s annual conference in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Richardson is the former chair of the Wyoming Arts Council. The award honors a chair or council member whose outstanding service, creative thinking and leadership enhance public support for the arts in his or her state and across the country.

“Bruce Richardson’s enthusiastic and steadfast advocacy on behalf of public funding for the arts has advanced the arts in Wyoming and across the nation,” says NASAA CEO Pam Breaux. “His exemplary leadership has broadened support for the arts in the civic, education, business and policy spheres. NASAA is pleased to salute Bruce’s many accomplishments with this award.”

Since arriving in Wyoming in 1984, Richardson has advocated for the arts as a board member and chair of the Wyoming Arts Council; board member and officer of NASAA; president of Casper’s Nicolaysen Art Museum; vice president of Casper’s ARTCORE; president of the Wyoming Council for the Humanities; adviser to arts organizations; and organizer and participant in many arts.

Called “Wyoming’s arts ambassador,” Richardson, in 80 essays and 200 speeches, has detailed the value and extent of the arts in Wyoming and ways to make things better. He received the Governor’s Arts Award in 2014 and was named Casper Citizen of the Year in 2015.

During his 31 years at UW-Casper, he taught courses including Shakespeare, Chaucer, horror literature, and living Wyoming writers and artists. In 2015, he received UW’s highest teaching honor, the Ellbogen Lifetime Teaching Award.

NASAA is the membership organization that unites, represents and serves the nation’s state and jurisdictional arts agencies.