State Funding of the Arts

THW ban the state funding of the arts

PROPOSITION - because it uses an ignorant majority's money to dangerously distort artistic license

DEFINITION

Banning the state funding of arts would mean the cessation of using any government money for the subsidizing of any contemporary individual artists, art foundations or exhibitions. This does not apply to funding the maintenance, purchase, and exhibition of old art works, museums etc.

(as these are not involved in the promotion of present day arts and artists and therefore are not part of the debate.)

When talking about arts, this debate will be concerned with paintings, music, photography, sculptures or anything that might be subsidized by federal organizations such as the National Endowment Association in the USA or the Arts Council of England. Such organizations, under the proposition, should stop existing.

* HIEARARCHY: DEFENSE & OTHER THINGS

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* A MAJORITY'S MONEY PAY FOR A MINORITY'S LUXURIES

Art funding has as an overarching aim to back up a certain person's artistic career and to preserve what are deemed suitable artworks. This is not a right for everyone to have but is actually a luxury. Therefore, the government does not have the burden of funding art works or artists but in fact chooses to do so. Given this, any reduction or cancellation in the funding is justified as it does not infringe on anyone's ability to access their civil and/or human rights. This draws a defined line between art subsidies and subsidies that go towards welfare payments et al., demonstrating an obvious difference between the two.

The very nature of art is very subjective and cannot be classified into 'suitable' and 'non-suitable'. This is because art means different things to different people. This is because its value lays in that it appeals to emotions and perceptions that a person might or might not have. Some people might appreciate some forms of art that others do not understand because of different cultural, social, or other stimuli that they lack. Art that one might find appealing someone else might see as actively insulting; especially where religion and politics tend to get involved.

Given the above idea, many people do not have the artistic inclination or just the stimuli to appreciate most types of modern art that is subsidized by the government. This is because the art is chosen by a group of people who have an expert view on the subject and who most likely choose to back 'suitable' art that is based on their personal perceptions of what art is.

This doesn't represent the tax payer, who contributes the $160 million, because he most likely doesn't understand the art that he's paying for. This means that the ignorant majority pay for something that a minority only can appreciate. In this case, it's better to allow the funding to private institutions, not the government.

* PROMOTES UNWANTED GOVERNMENT INTERFERANCE

Art should be the ability to freely express one's ideas and emotions. By backing people up with government money, it is inevitable that the government exercises a significant influence over what that person produces. This is because, if the government deems certain types of art to be 'unacceptable', then it can withhold funding and thus hinder the artist's ability to produce that type of art.

This can be observed in the recent case of Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences v. City of New York where, in 1999, NY Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, offended by a controversial depiction of the Virgin Mary in a certain art exhibition, decided to stop the funding for the museum until the exhibition was cancelled and taken off. Although the funding was finally restored after a court order, this case outlines how easy it is for the government to bar the type of art that it doesn't want and highlights the influence that state art funding can have on promoting or withholding art production.

Furthermore, the government can also, apart from controlling what artists create, push its own personal agenda. This has parallels with Stalinist 'Socialist Realist' trends that happen to eulogize government policies or certain ideals not shared by everyone. Although this might sound chimerical in today's constitutional democracies, allowing the government a say in what type of art will be promoted sets a very dangerous precedent. This is illustrated in how dependent these federal arts grants institutions are on the government: in the US the NEA Chairman is always appointed by the president.

For example, there was a lot of controversy surrounding the American National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) funding of pro-Obama art during the election campaign of 2009. It was alleged, and subsequently proven, that the NEA was sponsoring artists who would produce art that had favourable depictions of the presidential candidate. This meant that the taxpayer was not only paying for the funding of a political side, but that the NEA was turning from a neutral organization to a slanted one with a political agenda. Even if it can be argued that one person actuated this bias and it doesn't represent what the NEA as a whole would do, it goes a long way to illustrate exactly how easily these 'art' subsidies can be used for questionable purposes; this aided by the fact that the notion of 'art' is very vague and can therefore be interpreted in dubious, and thus prone to abuse, ways.

Apart from government interference, wherever the state funds something, lobby groups also influence the type of content that will be shown. If that content depicts controversial issues, like religion, sexual content, or other volatile ideas, then the government will face a public backlash from people who find the content offensive.

This has been observed in many cases. Below are a few examples:

1) The case of the 'NEA Four', who had their funding vetoed by John Frohnmayer even though they passed through a successful peer review, was one in which the subject matter and contents of their art was offensive to the religious right. The government decided not to grant artists endowment because of "decency" issues.

2) During the late 70s, the Arts Council of Great Britain came under fire for being elitist and politically biased. This resulted in a reduction of the endowment by the British government.

3) Robert Mapplethorpe, a homosexual photographer and artist who had his work displayed in an NEA exhibition, came under fire