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Presidential Arts Policies on the Campaign Trail, Pt. 2

   |   September 26, 2008   8:01 AM
2 Comments
Categorized Under: Uncategorized

The Los Angeles Times art critic Christopher Knight says that we won’t hear about cultural policy during the presidential debates, not because cultural policy is trivial, but because the debates are designed to be trivial. They aren’t debates at all “but elaborately scripted reality television shows.”

So how about considering these issues?

As it stands now, corporate arts funding is just a self-congratulatory form of cautious corporate advertising — and tax deductible to boot. No corporation will ever provide wide-ranging economic stimulus for a free and vibrant creative community. And that’s bad cultural policy.

Second, how about the National Endowment for the Arts, neutered 15 years ago in the culture wars? At its 1992 peak, the NEA budget was a pathetic $176 million, or about 84 cents per citizen. With a budget now of $145 million — not quite five hours’ worth of the Iraq occupation — it’s withered to less than 50 cents per capita.

But forget about budget debates, which turn the discussion away from common public interest and toward special-interest lobbying. Instead, what if the NEA just changed the rules? What if, say, its art museum exhibition grants were available only to shows that are open free to the public? That one small policy change would cause a profound shift in the way American museums do business.

Currently, the public pays three times. We indirectly subsidize art museums through their tax-exempt status. We are taxed for the NEA. Finally, we have the privilege of privately ponying up at the museum box office to see the art. That’s more bad cultural policy.

These two examples, taxpayer equity and a public-spirited NEA, both represent a cultural perspective at the opposite end of the spectrum from where we stand today.

  • http://museaus,hunkasaurus.com Tom Hendricks

    Beyond the money, is the problem of how the money is used.
    Now it goes to art groups with the hope of it trickling down to parts of the community. I suggest ground up funding is better and would not only support art groups but individual artists who seldom get any support now at all.
    Let the government fund art centers. Then let the community open the art centers to the artists of that community plus traveling artists. Instead of a hit and miss approach that supports certain groups but not others, and seldom if ever supports individual artists outside of groups; the art centers supports them all.
    The art center allows for all artists at all levels to show or perform their art. And bigger groups no longer have to worry about funding, building maintenance, etc. They can concentrate on their art.
    The difficult part is for some art groups to share their space, even with all the benefits it’ll bring them. I see it as an underlying stubbornness, and snobbishness that has hurt all the arts.
    This post talks about the price to the public.. With art centers there is no need for the NEA. We only need their checks sent to community art centers – their job is done. With art centers, the art groups should be able to dump tax-exempt status and make a profit. That leaves the ticket price at the door. The city can determine what that is. Perhaps on weekdays it’s low or no price at all. On hectic weekends with better talent, the price goes up.
    Most importantly the art centers open up arts to all – all types of artists, and all types of art lovers.

  • Rawlins Gilliland

    EX-cel-lent Post, Jerome! Thanks for linking L.A. Knight’s informative and decent sense overview. It saddens me sad as one who would walk barefoot to Abilene to speak to anyone interested on the virtues and the value of the NEA. It changed my life and the lives of millions. One of my favorite factoids about the NEA is that it was signed into being by the unlikely pen-holder; Richard Nixon.