Buchwalter, Introduction

Andrew Buchwalter – “Introduction”
History:
- There is very little historical basis for government funding of the arts prior to the 1960s. Much of this stems from the pursuit of creating a limited government, for the founding fathers stressed the idea that “government is best which governs least.” There were a few federally commissioned art projects to enhance the building and grounds of the new capitol city in Washington, D.C. in the early 1800s. Another glimmer of public support for the arts came as part of FDR’s New Deal program under the Federal Arts Project. However, this was a part of an emergency relief plan, not an acceptance of public funding of the arts.
- The shift came in the 1960s when Congress enacted legislation creating the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). This marked an American acknowledgment that “support for culture is a legitimate government responsibility.” While there was much objection and criticism over the creation of these organizations, the debate was relatively calm until 1989. At the center of the 1989 explosion of controversy was Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ. This photograph of a crucifix submerged in a jar of urine had been featured at an NEA-supported awards program and exhibit in North Carolina. Also eliciting a fury of anger was photography by Robert Mapplethorpe featuring images of nude children and homoerotic activities that was scheduled to open in July 1989 at Washington D.C.’s Corcoran Gallery of Art. Senator Jesse Helms proposed an amendment that would prohibit the use of federal funds for such obscene, indecent, or offensive art (the details are more specific, but I am trying to be concise). While the Helms amendment didn’t pass, Congress did create “anti-obscenity oath” that, according to some, was a provision that was “considered to have a chilling effect on artistic expression.” A great public and legal debate ensued with artists fighting for the freedom of expression and political leaders attacking filthy, blasphemous art and calling standards of decency.

Publicly Subsidized Culture
- There is no debate that culture is a valuable component of civilization, but there is serious debate as to whether or not culture should be publicly funded.
Economic debate:
- CON: Works in arts and humanities merit economic survival only if they can support themselves. If individuals are unwilling to pay for such items, neither should their government.
- PRO: Market mechanisms do not always accurately mirror individual preferences. With this in mind, cultural commodities are public goods, whose compensation cannot be efficiently left to market forces and therefore government subsidy is justified.
- Response (CON): Cultural commodities are not public goods (such as national defense, public safety, and air quality) because not everyone can enjoy and appreciate them. Many forms of art are reserved for the few, the elite, and not for the general public.
- Response to Response (PRO): Art may be a mixed-public good and instead of working to defund art, we should work to expand the use and appreciation of art to the wider public.
Political debate:
- PRO: Art benefits the public interest, or what Rousseau called the “general will” of the people. Art promotes social continuity and cohesion.
- CON: Both the Constitution and the idea of a limited government give no authority to the national government to fund art or culture. And what about disruptive or offensive art?
- PRO: Such unsettling and disruptive art can strengthen the social realm by challenging dogmatically entrenched attitudes. Socially disruptive works are publically beneficial because they lead to a more open, tolerant, and heterogeneous society.

Is this good for art itself?
- There are arguments that public money is political money and that censorship may be the inevitable price of the government’s funding of the arts.
- Yet others contend that market forces do just the same, as artists would be reduced to producing works that are popular and that would fetch a good price.

Excellence, Access, and Control
- Funding decisions for the NEA and NEH are based on the standard of “artistic and humanistic excellence.” Who says what is good art and bad art?
- Others believe that more important than an arbitrary decree of excellence, is innovation – promoting “cutting-edge art”
- Others place emphasis on public accessibility and involvement. The “doing of art” should be more important than “simple exposure to it.”
- The control of art is torn between those that seek to preserve and perpetuate high culture and the great traditions of civilization, with those that seek to promote diversity.

Public Accountability and Freedom of Expression
- While artists and writers are free to create what they wish, works funded by the taxpayer ought to meet standards of public acceptability
- However, cultural creativity requires freedom and growth to flourish. To assume that the arts must satisfy conventional notions of social acceptability is to undermine their very rationale.
- Those that seek to hold artists accountable do not want to make this a freedom of speech issue, as Senator D’Amato states, “This matter does not involve freedom of artistic expression – it does involve the question of whether American taxpayers should be forced to support such trash.”
- Again we must be reminded that the idea of art is to challenge the status quo. “Marginalized groups are ill-served where forms of speech are expected to conform to the requirements of an ordained orthodoxy.”