Obama's Culture Team
Thursday, June 18, 2009
President Obama’s nominees to the nation's arts and humanities endowments are either safe and predictable -- or a major shake-up. We hear different reactions from reporter Robin Pogrebin of the New York Times and David A. Smith, a senior lecturer in American history at Baylor University and the author of "Money for Art: The Tangled Web of Art and Politics in American Democracy."
Comments [1]
Neither of the commentators, Robin Pogrebin nor David Smith, really addressed how much less effective the Dana Goia strategy of grants to arts organizations is, as opposed to the former Visual Arts Fellowship Program. Mr. Smith only can claim that the funding to organizations is less controversial. I have to disagree. I'm not sure that the commentators understand just how low the visual artist is in the eyes of the NEA and NEA funded programs since 1995.
Current NEA grants fall into the hands of bureaucrats including social welfare organizations which have little or no background in fine arts.
Granting directly to artists is the safest strategy for achieving high quality artwork for the public.
I might differ with Ms. Pogrebin in tone. The NEA does not necessarily have to support risky (aka 'controversial')work. Although, it shouldn't be running from it either. The criteria can simply be excellence. The NEA, should re-affirm its original mission of supporting great works of art, and doing that means supporting the best artists--not bureaucrats who exploit arts for other agendas.
The NEA should implement a nomination process from their state affilate organizations who already have individual arts fellowships for around $5,000. States could nominate a few of their best for a larger NEA Fellowship, avoiding some of the great expense and controversy of the former open-nomination process.
Restoring the Fellowships is critical to the NEA and the nations arts. Avoiding controversy is not always possible, but building a greater costituency and better public relations for visual artists should go hand and hand with NEA Fellowships.
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