Arts Funding and Obama

Back in the day when I regularly subjected myself to the sneers and jeers of arch-conservatives on a far-right political blog, it became obvious to me that only a practical argument (i.e., one that demonstrated the related potential financial gain) as to the value of arts funding would even begin to make a dent in their outright rejection of the idea that tax dollars should ever be spent to support the arts. Any attempt to suggest our souls were as important as our wallets would inevitably lead to questions of "how could photographs of crucifixes submerged in urine be good for our souls?", and it was all down hill from there. Further, any attempt to suggest we should subsidize the practices of our promising artists produced near-rabid howling and charges of Communism. "Let the bums get a real job."

With this understanding of how many conservatives (and moderates) see arts funding, then, it was no surprise to me that Barack Obama would frame his support of funding the arts in practical terms. Artinfo.com's Allen Strouse sees it differently:

According to information available from the Barack Obama campaign, the Illinois senator believes that the arts should be a “central part of effective teaching and learning.” He proposes increasing funding to expand public/private partnerships between schools and arts organizations, and he intends to create an “Artists Corps” of trained artists to work in low-income schools and their communities. Obama also hopes to increase funding to the NEA, whose budget has been slashed by $50 million since 1992. All of these are worthy, unobjectionable (from my vantage point) policy goals, but his stated motives are problematic. To quote from his platform at length:

To remain competitive in the global economy, America needs to reinvigorate the kind of creativity and innovation that has made this country great. To do so, we must nourish our children’s creative skills. In addition to giving our children the science and math skills they need to compete in the new global context, we should also encourage the ability to think creatively that comes from a meaningful arts education. …The Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts recently said “The purpose of arts education is not to produce more artists, though that is a byproduct. The real purpose of arts education is to create complete human beings capable of leading successful and productive lives in a free society.

While it is not surprising that Obama considers competitiveness a virtue, it is disconcerting that he seems to think the value of arts education is that it creates better workers or citizens, not better artists.

I'm not sure Strouse read that correctly, though. The NEA Chairman said the purpose of artist education is not to produce more artists. Neither he, nor Obama, is commenting on whether it contributes to better artists. One can assume, I believe, that better education leads to better support of the arts and that predisposition will inevitably lead to support for all artists. Indeed, I'm not at all sure any government system can "create" better artists anyway.

While I might quibble about the stated "real purpose" of arts education, I think this line of reasoning is best suited to attract the widest support among moderates and disenfranchised conservatives likely to cast a vote for the Democratic nominee come November. In fact, I'm not all that comfortable with the idea that "more" or even "better" artists can be brought about by spreading money about. I do believe we should increase support for spreading the word about the art being created by self-motivated artists. Also, I believe in state-funded financial rewards/grants for artists who achieve something significant.

Strouse sounds more than a bit paranoid, IMO, in his next read:

By the same token, as much as one is tempted to grow excited about his promise to attract foreign artistic talent to the U.S. (by loosening visa restrictions), his campaign’s motives for sending American artists abroad seem to border on the propagandistic:

Through efforts like that of the United States Information Agency, America’s cultural leaders were deployed around the world during the Cold War as artistic ambassadors and helped win the war of ideas by demonstrating to the world the promise of America. Artists can be utilized again to help us win the war of ideas against Islamic extremism. Unfortunately, our resources for cultural diplomacy are at their lowest level in a decade. Barack Obama will work to reverse this trend and improve and expand public-private partnerships to expand cultural and arts exchanges throughout the world.

Here Obama makes use of clichéd capitalist and military metaphors: “utilizing” art to win a “war of ideas.” It’s a rhetoric that is likely to offend anyone who believes in the autonomy of the arts, in an art that needs no justification, in the aesthete’s credo of l’art pour l’art. It’s also a rhetoric that Obama might live to regret: Linking political interests with artists, aestheticians, bohemians, and subversives in general could unleash a monstrous arts-industrial complex comparable to Eisenhower’s feared military-industrial complex. Ike had his H-bombs; Barack could arm the U.S. with a brigade of nihilistic installation artists.

Strouse might want to pick up Lindsay Pollock's book on Edith Halpert. It contains an account of how the gallerist worked to organize an exhibition of American artists that was held in Soviet Moscow. It was a point of pride for her (and she let the Soviet press know it) that no government official interfered with her choices, even after a highly public dispute between her and President Eisenhower about what "good" art looked like. The notion that Obama's practical rationale might "unleash a monstrous arts-industrial complex" sounds absurd to be quite blunt about it.

Strouse also gets a bit carried away responding to what he sees as both Obama and Clinton's refusal to cite the value of art for art's sake in their platforms (McCain doesn't even mention the arts in his), concluding:

With his willingness to make the arts subservient to capital, Obama may weaken their potential as a social force in their own right. And while Clinton plays the same game, trying to sell the arts with political arguments, she does so less insistently, less effectively. She rarely justifies her proposals. When she does, she uses arguments that Obama has made more emphatically. And her rhetoric lacks the flourishes that will make Obama’s platform easily digestible to the public. Where Clinton limply “recognize[s] the value of arts and culture as an economic engine,” Obama forcefully asserts that “the nonprofit arts industry generates $166.2 billion in economic activity annual for the U.S. economy, supports 5.7 million full-time jobs, and returns $12.6 billion in income tax revenue back to the federal government.”

"Willingness to make the arts subservient to capital?" That's one of the largest leaps I've read in a long time.

I don't think art's potential as a social force in its own right is affected by how much the government supports it financially as much as personally, actually. I think a President should demonstrate this potential by inviting artists to the White House and being seen taking in exhibitions at museums and such, sending the message that art appreciation is a personal experience. Trying to suggest it benefits our national soul will enrage a good portion of the population. You can't make that horse drink.

Arts education, on the other hand, should be justified in terms that every American, across the political spectrum, can appreciate. It doesn't offend me in the slightest that Obama's platform is focused on a practical rationale for his support of the arts. It's a convincing argument for the largest swath of Americans, and it will certainly be a vast improvement over either the current situation or (one must assume) McCain's ambivalence. There is never any guarantee that support for the arts will create "better" artists. It's foolish to even discuss support in those term, in my opinion. The best we, as a society, can do is ensure there is support for the artists we have.