For some weird reason, FOX News found it worth noting yesterday that actor Alec Baldwin and a bunch of other artsy types gathered in Washington for Arts Advocacy Day, in order to encourage lobbying for arts funding. That means, among other things, the National Endowment for the Arts. I guess my invitation got lost in the mail.
Baldwin and others addressed a "crowd of… lawmakers and state arts officials". I’m sorry, but as an artist I find the words "state arts officials" really creepy.
I can’t say that I really know that much about how the NEA funds things like dance or theater, but they have become notorious in recent years for funding controversial, shocking, offensive and ugly art exhibits. They probably fund a lot of other stuff, too, but they are best known for bankrolling modernist, anti-Christian claptrap.
I have considered applying for a grant, myself, but in the end I just couldn’t do it. It generally means attaching your art to some (liberal) cultural theme like "Art and Global Warming", "Art and the Inner City", "Art and the Goddess", or some such… it would just kill my soul.
Personally, I think the only visual art that the government should fund is art for public spaces. Murals, sculptures, that sort of thing. They should also feel an obligation to fund art that is not so "current" that it will fall out of style a couple of decades down the road. We owe it to our kids to leave something beautiful behind us, rather than rusting hulks of scrap metal.
Back in the Nineties, Congress made some big cuts to the NEA after it endowed some particularly stupid pieces that got a ton of press. It looked like they might let the agency dry on the vine.
No such luck. In his speech Tuesday, Baldwin said "If you told me back in 1996, we would have a Republican president and Republicans in charge of both houses of Congress, and the NEA would be flourishing and would be safe, it wouldn’t be possible…".
Amen, brother. Amen.
Tim,
Historically, we all know who used to be the greatest single partron of the arts! And in the Enlightenment era, the State started funding art specifically to counter the Church. There are some very few people out there who are trying to counter Modernism in the arts, but unfortunately, those atrocious styles are highly institutionalized in the government, academia, and even in the official documents of some bishop’s conferences. There is a movement back to the classical tradition in architecture, which was started at Notre Dame University. You might want to check out a website devoted to this: http://www.grandtradtion.net In my opinion, good art matters, how much of the recent decline of faith may be due to iconoclasm?
Mark
I heard one artist speculating recently that the reason large, abstract pieces are the default style for many new buildings is that such works DON’T have any meaning, and as such are “safe”. After all, how can anyone protest something if they don’t know what it is or what it means?
It’s also cheaper.
Yes, art does matter quite a lot. The next post in my “But Is It Art?” series will discuss that.
Tim, considering your odd taste in art, such as the fact you don’t appreciate a great master like Mark Rothko, I’m glad you’re not in charge of the NEA. Now actually that brings up a good point: what about Rothko’s fine work is offensive or anti-Christian? That said, I’m not saying the NEA should exist at all, or anything like that.
BTW, your opinion about Helen Frankenthaler struck me as odd too. Frankenthaler is pretty good.
I hope no one takes offense at this. I think you’re a talented artist. It’s your opinions about art I find to be odd.
I misspelled the URL: it’s http://www.grandtradition.net/
I look forward to your future posting here on the subject of art.
To be fair to Tim, he never said that Rothko’s art was either offensive or anti-Christian. I know that in the post he was referring to the Madonna with elephant dung and things of that nature.
What makes my suspicions about the value of non-objective art “odd”?
Is it odd that I don’t think all forms of visual art must be equally valid? I believe there is good reason to assert they are not.
I can back up my opinions, but that is for a coming post. Will everyone agree? Nah.