Zombie Banks, Art Museums, & War

The equation is a simple one, in good economic times people feel they can afford to support the arts, in bad economic times - much less so. I do not mean to frame the question of art purely in financial terms, since some of the greatest art we know of has been created in the most impoverished settings and some of the best artists were, and are… paupers. Moreover, no matter how dire things are, art always has the capacity to bring relief and inspiration to those in low spirits. What I mean to express is simply that artists need to pay their rent like every other worker, and at present some one million American workers are losing their jobs each month.

Yesterday Wall Street stocks tumbled to new record lows as financial leviathans demanded billions more in bailout funds. A new term is making the rounds, "Zombie Banks", an expression that describes insolvent banks kept operating through infusions of government bailout money. An older expression is also making the rounds - Depression.

Americans for the Arts (AFTA) has estimated that this year national arts organizations will layoff some 10% of their work force, or roughly 260,000 people. AFTA has also voiced the expectation that of the nation’s 100,000 arts organizations - some 10% will permanently close down. Clearly, the arts are being deeply affected by the economic collapse and the situation will undoubtedly get worse. The following list of U.S. museums that are closing or enacting deep cutbacks is but a partial account from just this past February. It illustrates the absurdity of thinking President Obama’s inclusion of $50 million for national arts funding in his stimulus package will have any substantial impact upon America’s deteriorating cultural landscape.

The High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia, will cut salaries and eliminate 7 percent of its workforce. Director Michael Shapiro said, "As with many non-profit institutions both in Atlanta and across the country, the High Museum of Art has been affected by the economic downturn, experiencing shortfalls in income we receive through donations and membership as well as losses to our endowment." Shapiro will take a 7 percent cut in pay and other director-level employees will receive a 6 percent cut. All other workers at the museum will receive a 5 percent cut in pay.

The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland, has laid-off seven of its 150 employees, imposed a salary and hiring freeze, and cancelled a major exhibition of works by French painter Jean-Leon Gerome - an exhibit that would have been a collaborative project with the Musee d'Orsay in Paris and the Getty in Los Angeles. The museum’s budget has been reduced from $14.5 million to $12.5 million. The Walters also faces a 36 percent reduction in state funding, which means a loss of $420,000 for the museum next year.

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra is also facing state funding cuts, which could mean a loss of some $700,000 for the beleaguered orchestra. The Baltimore Opera Company is now seeking bankruptcy protection and the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra has suspended performances for the rest of the season, with the Baltimore Theatre Project announcing it may have to do the same. The Maryland Historical Society, suffering a 31 percent reduction of endowments and a drop in state funding, has laid-off six staff members.

The Philadelphia Museum of Art has laid-off 16 members of its staff. The museum is not only reducing staff, it is postponing exhibits, decreasing programs, and cutting salaries. Senior staff are receiving salary cuts from between five and 10 percent. The museum has suffered a loss of $90 million in endowments, and the donations continue to shrink. Museum chair H.F. Lenfest bluntly stated, "If endowment keeps being reduced in value there are going to be further steps taken. We would anticipate further reductions in personnel and operating." The museum is also being hit hard by reductions in state funding, which this year dropped from $3 million to $2.4 million - with further cuts expected for next year. The museum wants to increase admission fees, an act that must first be approved by the city.

The Detroit Institute of the Arts will be laying off 63 of its 301 employees, a 20 % reduction in staff, as it attempts to cut its budget by $6 million. The museum is reducing its number of exhibits in a further attempt to save money, and it has already cancelled three exhibitions this year for lack of funds - an exhibit on Baroque art, a showing of works by Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Jim Dine, and an exhibit of prints and drawings related to books. The museum also faces a total elimination of state funding, as Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s proposed budget for the state of Michigan puts an end to state arts funding, which would mean a devastating loss of $950,000 for the hard pressed DIA.

The Las Vegas Art Museum closed its doors on February 28, 2009. It shall retain its name in the hopes of re-opening if and when the economy improves. The museum faced a budget crisis that threatened to lay off workers and reduce salaries. Museum director Libby Lumpkin resigned over the announced cuts, and soon after the museum closed its doors.

New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art has announced a hiring freeze and is restricting staff travel, as well as the use of temporary employees. In addition the museum will close 15 of its gift stores across the nation. The Met’s endowment has suffered a 30% reduction and museum attendance and membership has fallen due to declining tourism. The Met is considering other ways to reduce its budget, with museum president Emily Rafferty saying that "we cannot eliminate the possibility of a head-count reduction."

The Indianapolis Museum of Art will cut its staff by 10%, eliminating 15 full-time positions and 6 part-time positions. Ten senior staff members will receive salary cuts in a plan that takes 3 percent of their wages as "donations" to the institution. Endowments have fallen $101 million since this fall. The museum receives less than 1 % of its budget from government funding.

The following should put everything in context. The Associated Press reported on February 26, 2009, that President Obama has proposed war spending that nears "$11 billion a month for the next year and a half despite the planned drawdown of U.S. forces in Iraq." The AP went on to report that Obama plans on spending around $75 billion in emergency war funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through next fall, on top of which his new budget asks for $130 billion to carry out the wars for fiscal year 2010. The same AP story reports that these costs are just "part of the nearly $534 billion Obama wants for regular Pentagon operations next year. Altogether, Obama is asking for $739 billion for the military through the fall of 2010."

Edward Biberman Revisited

Edward Biberman was born in Philadelphia in 1904, but left his mark as a California Modernist painter. Now almost forgotten save for aficionados of the California Modernist school, Biberman is the subject of a fascinating retrospective: Edward Biberman Revisited, at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery in Barnsdall Park.

While the small Biberman exhibit catalog that accompanies the show rightly describes Biberman as an important post war California Modernist artist, and notes his having created paintings of great social import, little is said about the artist’s embrace of social realism or the political controversies that swirled around him. This shortcoming is exacerbated by the layout of the show itself, which presents no coherent timeline for the paintings, but rather presents works from the early 30s and 40s alongside those created in the 70s and 80s. Unfortunately this makes it difficult to see how the artist progressed, and especially how he was buffeted by and reacted to, historic events.

Captions for paintings are also short on pertinent details, leaving all but the most stalwart students of history clueless about the subjects depicted in Biberman’s remarkable paintings. Despite these deficiencies, Edward Biberman Revisited is a must see exhibit and I commend the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery for presenting it to the public. In this article I will focus on just two of the noteworthy paintings in the show, Biberman’s contemporary Pieta, and the portrait of African American actor, singer, and political radical, Paul Robeson. I will also endeavor to present some of the background information on Mr. Biberman that was unfortunately left out of the exhibit.

In the early 1920s, the 19-year-old Biberman rented a studio in Paris, where he became familiar with exponents of Modernism and their works. Despite the experiments with cubism and abstraction that he witnessed all around him, Biberman would later say that he "quickly decided abstractionism was not for me." He would not only embrace realism in painting, he would stubbornly continue to adhere to it even as abstract art became ascendant and completely dominant in the art world. From Paris he moved to Berlin, but felt uneasy with the rightward drift he witnessed in German society. He described his Berlin neighborhood as a "Nazi nest" and pulled up stakes for America, where he acquired a studio on 57th Street in New York. He did well, painting portraits of individuals like Martha Graham and Joan Crawford, but then came the stock market crash in 1929 and Edward’s father, a businessman ruined by the crash - committed suicide.

At this point Edward Biberman became committed to using his art in addressing the world’s injustices. He started to paint workers, the unemployed, and the disenfranchised. He respected the Mexican Muralist Movement to the highest degree, having met Rivera, Siqueiros, and Orozco while in New York. In 1935 Biberman decided to move to California, and so drove across country, stopping in New Mexico where he painted alongside Georgia O’Keefe before continuing to Los Angeles. In 1939 Biberman painted his Pieta, a masterpiece that has as much relevance today as when the artist first painted it. There is no doubt that the work was inspired by his exposure to Mexico’s radical social realists, but one can also assume that what he discovered in Los Angeles, a segregated city where Chicanos and Mexican immigrants formed a permanent underclass, also contributed to the creation of the painting.

[ Pieta - Edward Biberman. Oil on canvas. 1939. 44 x 35 in. On view at the L.A. Municipal Art Gallery. Image courtesy of Gallery Z. ]

Though Pieta depicts what appears to be a Mexican Indian woman mourning over the body of a slain worker, the painting has a universal and timeless quality to it. The murdered proletarian lies face down on the ground in an ungainly position, his placard flung to one side as his blood coagulates around his head. The backdrop is an endless space where land, sea, and sky meet, lending a sense of the surreal to the scene. An up close examination of the painting reveals a masterly application of paint, with Biberman having built up layers of transparent colors to great effect. His gloppy brush strokes of golden ochre paint perfectly replicate a parched and unforgiving earth. Pieta is as good a work of social realism as I have ever seen produced by anyone, anywhere, and it should be known by all.

While in his new home city of L.A. Biberman met actress and artist Sonja Dahl at a meeting of the Hollywood Anti-Nazi League, an anti-fascist organization that helped German émigrés settle in the U.S. (the league helped famed author Thomas Mann settle in L.A.) Biberman and Dahl fell in love and married as WWII was approaching, moving into a modest home located just below the famous Hollywood sign.

Edward’s brother, Herbert J. Biberman, arrived in Hollywood to pursue work as a director, screenwriter and producer of films. Herbert also became active in the Anti-Nazi League, and Sonja Dahl-Biberman later recalled that at the time, anyone who was anti-Nazi was suspected of being a communist. When the war ultimately broke out, Edward served as a corporal in the state guard, and Sonja joined the Women’s Ambulance and Defense Guard. The war lasted four-and-a-half years, and with the defeat of fascism the Biberman’s and their friends felt they had won a great collective victory - but then came the Cold War, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and the anti-communist hysteria that came to be known as McCarthyism. In her December 2003 article for the Los Angeles Times Magazine, A Place in the Sun, Catching Up with Edward Biberman’s Los Angeles, Emily Young wrote:

"Though his portraits of Lena Horne and Dashiell Hammett are in the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery, the left-leaning Biberman initially devoted more of his energy to depicting Depression-era bread lines, the struggles of organized labor and the Communist witch hunt in Hollywood that undercut his career. (….) Biberman remained popular until social realism, a style he used for his politically charged paintings, fell out of favor. When his brother was branded a member of the Hollywood Ten, he suffered further from guilt by association. Still, Biberman continued to paint, teach and write, developing a pre-Hockney Los Angeles aesthetic that would influence the art world's next generation."

While Ms. Young’s recollection of Biberman’s early work is technically accurate, she fails to convey to the reader the noxious atmosphere of political repression Biberman was laboring under, or exactly why social realism "fell out of favor." Lena Horne, the great African American singer and actress, and Dashiell Hammett, author of detective stories like The Thin Man and The Maltese Falcon, were both named as communists at HUAC hearings and found themselves blacklisted. In 1947 Ms. Horne was marked as a "communist sympathizer" for her civil rights activism and friendship with Paul Robeson, and was thus unable to perform on television, radio or in the movies until the late 1950s.

Political repression came home for Edward Biberman in a profoundly personal way when he was identified as a communist by a "friendly witness" to HUAC because he had helped to organize an Artist’s Union within the WPA project. His beloved wife Sonja was also identified as a communist by a "friendly witness" to HUAC. Then his brother Herbert was accused in 1947 of participating in "communist activities" by HUAC, along with nine other Hollywood professionals who became known as the Hollywood Ten.

At the HUAC hearings Herbert took the 5th amendment, refusing to name "fellow communists" or to confirm or deny the allegations made against him. In 1950 he would be sentenced to six months in prison and barred from working in Hollywood. Even though he had little money Edward worked tirelessly to get his brother out on parole and help pay his legal fees, actions which made him suspect in the eyes of the government. Dashiell Hammett would later be found guilty of contempt of Congress for refusing to name communist associates and was sent to prison for six months in 1951.

One of Biberman’s paintings in the Municipal Art Gallery exhibit is titled, Conspiracy. It depicts a group of white men in suits, huddled before a bank of microphones. Painted as a simple agitated line drawing in burnt umber filled in with a limited palette of mute earth colors, the image suggests a plot of some sort. The gallery provides absolutely no information as to what the painting gives a picture of, but it is not had to see that the oil on masonite painting is a direct reference to the HUAC witch trials and the persecution of Mr. Biberman, his wife, brother, and their professional associates.

In his celebrated biography Paul Robeson, author Martin Bauml Duberman described the political atmosphere in the U.S. at the time of Robeson having his portrait painted by Biberman in Los Angeles. Duberman specifically writes about a live performance Robeson gave at a 1949 NAACP Youth Council Rally in Los Angeles. It should be noted that just prior to his L.A. appearance, Robeson had given an August, ’49 performance in Peekskill, New York, where a huge violent mob motivated by racial hatred and anticommunism had almost succeeded in killing the black singer:

"The (Los Angeles) City Council dubbed Robeson’s coming concert an 'invasion' and unanimously passed a resolution urging a boycott. One councilman, Lloyd C. Davies, went out of his way to 'applaud and commend those in Peekskill who had the courage to get out there and do what they did to show up Robeson for what he is. I’d be inclined to be down there throwing rocks myself.' An FBI agent reported to J. Edgar Hoover that 'the Communist Party logically might endeavor to foment an incident at the concert in order to arouse the crowd.' Hollywood gossip columnists Louella Parsons and Jimmy Fidler fanned the flames with rumors of violence, and the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals published ads red-baiting Robeson. Charlotta Bass, publisher of the California Eagle, the black newspaper that sponsored Robeson’s Los Angles appearance, was swamped with threatening phone calls and denied insurance coverage.

Robeson’s supporters fought back. The Los Angeles NAACP Youth Council passed a resolution calling on all young people, black and white, to attend the concert. The prestigious national black fraternity (Robeson’s own), Alpha Phi Alpha, announced that it would host a luncheon in his honor the day following the concert. His supporters deluged the City Council with angry protests over its call for a boycott, and they turned out in force for the event itself. A tiny group of race-baiters did go to hear a local realtor call for the expulsion of all blacks and Jews from Los Angeles - but fifteen thousand went to hear Robeson, and the rally came off without incident.

A special force of black police officers (among them future Mayor Thomas Bradley) was assigned to protect Robeson. He thanked them from the podium and asked that the L.A. police protect 'every colored boy, every Mexican-American boy, every white boy on the streets of Los Angeles.' He thanked the Jewish people of Peekskill for having turned out in numbers to protect him in that town. And he thanked the crowd in front of him for having turned out to defend its own liberties. He would continue, he said, 'to speak up militantly for the rights of my people'; he told the rally that when asked the question 'Paul, what’s happened to you?' he replied, 'Nothing’s happened to me. I’m just looking for freedom.' Then he sang 'We Shall Not Be Moved,' and the last verse, 'Black and white together, we shall not be moved' brought the crowd to its feet."

In an interview with Biberman conducted in 1977 for the UCLA Special Collections, Biberman described Robeson sitting for his portrait; "We were never alone. He would always make several appointments here for the time that he was posing. Earl Robinson (who accompanied Robeson on piano during performances) would be sitting at this piano banging away a new tune that he wanted Paul to hear, and somebody would be reading a script, and somebody else would be interviewing him."

[ Paul Robeson - Edward Biberman. Oil on canvas. 1947. 50 x 34 in. On view at the L.A. Municipal Art Gallery. Image courtesy of Gallery Z. ]

Biberman’s portrait of Paul Robeson is a focal point of the exhibit at the Municipal Art Gallery, and it is an imposing work indeed, conveying all of the pride, determination, and dogged tenacity of the internationally famous singer. But aside from being an impressive painting of a formidable character, it is also confirmation of Biberman’s own valor, for it took no small amount of courage to stand up to HUAC and create a sympathetic portrait of Robeson during such trying times.

For those unable to attend the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery exhibition, a gallery of artworks by Edward Biberman can be seen here. Also, a fascinating interview was conducted with Biberman on April 15, 1964, for the Archives of American Art of the Smithsonian Institution. The interviewer asked Biberman for his evaluation of the WPA Federal Arts Project, and the artist’s timely answer has great resonance in the present:

"Well, of course I have a very partisan attitude to this whole matter. I am unequivocally in favor of it. I think it was one of the brightest spots in the history of American art, and I hope that we will see a revival of a government program. I fervently hope it will not be necessitated by another depression, which of course is what started the WPA project. That was a relief measure primarily, not a cultural measure. But irrespective of what brought it into being, and irrespective of the arguments against any government art program, and I think I'm familiar with all of the "anti" arguments, I find that this was an enormously productive period in American art. I think it actually brought into being and furthered the careers of many painters. The names of these artists are legion."

Edward Biberman Revisited runs at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Barnsdall Park until April 19, 2009. The Gallery is located at 4800 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90027. Phone: 323-644-6269. Hours, Thursday - Sunday, noon to 5:00 pm. Admission is free. On March 6, 2009 at 7:30 pm, the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery Associates (LAMAGA) will be screening Jeff Kaufman's 2006 documentary, Brush with Life: the Art of Being Edward Biberman. The film will be followed by a talk with Jeff Kaufman, the film's director, and Suzanne W. Zada, curator of the Edward Biberman Revisited exhibit. Seating is limited and reservations are required, call 323-644-6269 to reserve seats. A $25 donation is requested.

More Art Less War!

On February 17, 2009, President Barack Obama signed his massive $787 billion economic stimulus package into law. After an acrimonious quarrel in both houses of Congress, the somewhat altered and much trimmed down bill that reached the president’s desk managed to preserve funding for the arts - which at first glance appears to be a victory for arts advocates.

Obama’s Recovery and Reinvestment Act includes $50 million in funding for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), as well as $25 million for the Smithsonian Institute. A resolution introduced by Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma disallowing arts funding (an amendment that passed in the U.S. Senate by a 73 to 24 margin with the approval of many Democrats) was stripped from the final bill signed by the president. Rep. Louise M. Slaughter, a Democrat from New York who also co-chairs the Congressional Arts Caucus, avowed; "If we’re trying to stimulate the economy, and get money into the Treasury, nothing does that better than art." If that is the case, then why is such a paltry sum from the stimulus package allotted for the arts? - $50 million is only 0.0063 % of the enormous $787 billion stimulus package!

Temporary acting chair of the NEA, Patrice Walker Powell (the president has not as yet appointed a new head for the organization), said the final bill was "a great opportunity for the cultural workforce to be dignified as part of the American workforce." Robert L. Lynch, president of Americans for the Arts, stated; "It’s a huge victory for the arts in America. It’s a signal that maybe there is after all more understanding of the value of creativity in the 21st-century economy." These statements are mere hyperbole. The NEA’s current budget is $145 million, an amount set by the Bush administration, which raises the following questions:

Does an increase of $50 million in the NEA budget actually herald a groundbreaking new era in government support for the arts?

Is $195 million in cultural funding a sufficient amount to meet the needs of a nation as expansive and diverse as the United States of America?

From coast to coast artists and arts organizations are reeling from the effects of the economic collapse. In just one shocking example, Michigan’s Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm has entirely removed arts funding for the state’s proposed 2010 budget. This current fiscal year Michigan disseminated $7.9 million in arts and cultural grants to 290 organizations throughout the state. In an article published in the Michigan Messenger, Mike Latvis, director of public policy for ArtServe Michigan, is quoted saying that the $7.9 million "helped sustain 9,203 jobs, created 2,206 seasonal jobs and added 2,320 new jobs into Michigan’s economy." Latvis has also noted that "Michigan spends more on prisons in 36 hours than it spends all year on the arts", a fact rational people will consider a chilling indictment of contemporary U.S. society. Not that my home state of California is doing any better - the California Arts Council (CAC) has a budget of only $5.6 million. The National Assembly of State Arts Agencies (NASAA), placed California last when it comes to funding state arts agencies, noting that the CAC budget comes to a feeble 15 cents per capita - while the national average is $1.35.

Let us for a moment imagine the state of Michigan’s small arts budget as a national average, and that each of the 50 states in the union had an annual arts budget of just $7.9 million. That being the case, countrywide state expenditures on the arts would total $395 million - and we are to celebrate President Obama’s setting national arts funding at $195 million as a victory?

Exactly how much does $200 million purchase these days? Avi Arad, best known as the producer of the Spider-Man movies, has budgeted his upcoming Lost Planet movie at $200 million, which seems the average budget for today’s Hollywood "blockbuster." Should arts advocates be in a state of high excitement over the fact that a movie based on an Xbox video game has a higher budget than the National Endowment for the Arts?

On the same day President Obama signed the Recovery and Reinvestment Act, he announced plans to immediately send 17,000 U.S. soldiers to the open-ended war in Afghanistan. Some 34,000 U.S. troops are already there, and Obama plans to send an additional 30,000. Since its start in 2001, the war in Afghanistan has cost the U.S. taxpayer $439.8 billion. Thus far, I have no information regarding the monetary costs of Obama’s Afghanistan "surge", but while 598,000 Americans lost their jobs last month and that rate is not slowing down in the slightest - it is not hard to imagine that an ever-increasing war in Afghanistan is going to be a very costly affair.

While arts advocates are euphoric that the NEA budget is now approaching $200 million, they should stop to consider that President Obama is at this moment moving ahead with a major expansion of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. With the war in that country now rapidly escalating, the U.S. State Department is starting to solicit contractors to build "staff apartments, compound walls, and compound access facilities on the existing U.S. Embassy Compound in Kabul" - with a price tag of $200 million.

Spencer Jon Helfen: California Modernist Painting

Spencer Jon Helfen Fine Arts is tucked away on the second floor of a charming old building in Beverly Hills, and though most of those living in the city of Los Angeles have never heard of the gallery - it is one of L.A.’s treasures. The founder and director of the enterprise, Spencer Jon Helfen, has a passion for Modernist art of the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s - and his gallery specializes in the California School of Modernism that flourished in the state prior to World War II. Helfen’s gallery is an oasis of sorts, a setting where one can contemplate the thought-provoking and beautifully crafted figurative realist paintings that were once so highly regarded by the art world. The Helfen is one of the few galleries in the U.S. to consistently mount large-scale exhibits of California modernist paintings on a regular basis.

I attended the public reception for the Helfen’s current exhibition, Gallery Selections of Important California Modernist Paintings & Sculpture, which presents the Helfen’s latest acquisitions of works from the likes of Mabel Alvarez, Victor Arnautoff, Claude Buck, Francis De Erdely, John Mottram, Koichi Nomiyama, Helen Clark Oldfield, Otis Oldfield, Edouard Vysekal, Bernard Zakheim, and many others. Students and aficionados of figurative realist painting would do well to carefully examine the lives and works of each and every artist in the show, in addition to working at cultivating a deeper understanding of the early California Modernist school. I have an especially strong interest in that movement, not because I am a native born Californian, but for the reason that the school was disposed towards social engagement in art.

In this article I will focus upon two of the forgotten giants of the California Modernist movement included in the Helfen exhibit - Victor Arnautoff and Francis De Erdely. Exemplars of figurative realism, craft, and humanist concerns in art, Arnautoff and De Erdely are ripe for rediscovery, especially by those who seek an alternative to the vortex of today’s postmodern art follies.

[ Woman in Yellow Fur - Victor Arnautoff. Oil on board. 1934. Click here for a larger view of this painting. ]

Arnautoff’s oil paintings at the Spencer Jon Helfen Gallery, are lavish in detail, stunningly rich in color, and filled with texture - they are jewel-like works of social realism created by a technical virtuoso who possessed complete mastery over his materials. Arnautoff had a great talent for capturing, not just the likeness of a person, but something of their essence, and for me two of his portraits in the show form a focal point of the exhibit. His Woman in Yellow Fur is a stunning close-up portrayal of a young woman who, one must assume, is well-to-do, since she is draped in fur and the date of the portrait, 1934, places her right in the middle of the Great Depression. Her fancy attire notwithstanding, there is a sympathetic air about the woman. Arnautoff’s brushstrokes are particularly forceful in this painting, which is unusual for him. He also incised the paint surface using the sharp end of his brush, brilliantly replicating the appearance of fur. His juxtaposition of the warm yellow ochres and burnt siennas of the figure against the backdrop of a cold and pale ultramarine blue, makes for one attention-grabbing portrait.

Similarly, Arnautoff’s The Green Dress, is also a stunning likeness, but in this work there is absolutely no ambiguity as to the class background of the sitter. The haughty imposing blond with a large strand of pearls around her neck is clearly bourgeois, and her confident, piercing gaze informs you that she is familiar with the wielding of power. A slightly raised eyebrow lets you know that you are being carefully evaluated, even across the barriers of space and time. Again, the light ochre background and warm flesh tones of the sitter juxtaposed against the brilliant cadmium green dress makes for a dramatic use of color. It is a marvelous painting, one that I could gaze upon endlessly. How could such a gifted artist be so easily forgotten and sidelined by the passage of time? Truth be told, Arnautoff was written out of history - for aesthetic and political reasons.

Victor Arnautoff (1896-1979) was born in Tsarist Russia and fought as a Cavalry Officer in the Tsarist Imperial Army, which I suppose would categorize him as a "White Russian", or counter-revolutionary. Fearing persecution he fled the Soviet Union after the triumph of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, first going into exile in China where he would meet his future wife, and eventually making his way to Mexico, where he would undergo a remarkable transformation both artistically and politically. In the late 1920’s Arnautoff studied with and became an assistant to Diego Rivera in Mexico City, no doubt absorbing the master’s ideas regarding a resurgent muralist movement. Not since the Italian Renaissance had there been such a vital school of fresco mural painting as was to be found in Mexico during the 1930s. Rivera had studied the technique while traveling throughout Italy in 1920. Basically fresco involves painting on wet lime plaster with pigments mixed in water; once the moisture dries the color is fixed. Well-versed in the theory and practice of muralism, Arnautoff would make his real mark on the world when he came to settle in San Francisco, California, in the early 1930s.

Victor Arnautoff would help Diego Rivera paint two murals when the Mexican muralist first visited San Francisco from 1930-31; Allegory of California at the Pacific Stock Exchange, and Making of a Fresco located at the Art Institute of San Francisco. American artists in the San Francisco Bay area and beyond where electrified by Rivera’s murals and by the Mexican Muralist Movement in general, in which they perceived the possibilities of an equivalent muralist school for the United States. They would get their chance to initiate such a movement with the Coit Tower murals, which coincidentally were painted 75 years ago this month.

In 1933 Coit Tower was constructed atop Telegraph Hill as a city beautification project, immediately becoming a landmark attracting tourists. The Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the first government program to employ artists as part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), set out to create a series of monumental fresco paintings on the tower’s interior walls in 1934. The PWAP appointed Victor Arnautoff technical director for the mural project, and twenty-six artists were selected to design various artworks on the theme of "Aspects of California Life." Ten assistants also facilitated the work, doing everything from mixing pigments to grouting fresh plaster.

The production of the Coit Tower murals converged with two dramatic events that turned the project into a lightning rod for controversy. Diego Rivera’s mural at New York City’s Rockefeller Center, Man at the Crossroads, was destroyed by order of John D. Rockefeller on February 10, 1934, because one small part of the mural included a portrait of communist leader Vladimir Lenin. Many of the artists working on the Coit Tower murals had met Rivera, and were naturally against the destruction of his mural.

Victor Arnautoff and his fellow muralists also supported San Francisco’s longshoremen, seaman, waterfront workers, teamsters, and municipal workers - who went on strike against low wages, long hours and terrible working conditions on May 9, 1934. On July 5, 1934, in an effort to defeat the strike, employers used strike breakers with police escorts to move goods from piers to warehouses - riots ensued, with the police shooting dead two strikers on what came to be called Bloody Thursday. Up to 40,000 people held a funeral march for the slain workers, an event Arnautoff memorialized in a drawing unrelated to the Coit murals. In the aftermath of the lethal police repression, the entire city of San Francisco was shut down in a great General Strike which lasted three days - it was the biggest labor action in U.S. history.

Arnautoff and a number of the other artists working on the Coit Tower murals felt it necessary to comment on these events - and so included certain images in their murals. For instance, in his mural titled Library, artist Bernard Zakheim depicted a group of men gathered in the periodicals room of a library, reading newspapers whose headlines referred to the destruction of Rivera’s mural as well as to the San Francisco maritime strike. Zakheim included a portrait of fellow Coit Tower muralist, John Langley Howard, reaching for a shelved copy of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital. Zakheim also included a self-portrait in his mural, showing himself reading a copy of the Torah in Hebrew, with other sacred books in Hebrew close at hand. No doubt the rampant anti-Semitism of the period contributed as much to attacks on the mural project as did anti-communism.

The press became indignant over the small amount of left-wing imagery found in the murals, the San Francisco Chronicle branding them "red propaganda". As right-wing outrage over the murals intensified, the PWAP almost give in to conservative pressure, slating Zakheim’s mural, and a number of others, for whitewashing. The opening of Coit Tower for public viewing of the murals was delayed for months, and fortunately the controversy subsided. When the Tower was finally opened to the public only one mural had actually been censored, Steelworker, a portrait of a tough looking laborer by Clifford Wight. The artist had incorporated the slogan "Workers of the World Unite" into the portrait’s background - PWAP had the slogan obliterated.

[ City Life - Victor Arnautoff. Detail of fresco mural. 1934. In this detail from the artist’s expansive Coit Tower mural, Arnautoff pictured himself standing next to a newstand, where two radical publications were conspicuously painted; The New Masses - an American Marxist journal that featured writings from the likes of Upton Sinclair, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes and Ernest Hemingway, and The Daily Worker - the newspaper published by the American Communist Party (CPUSA). ]

Victor Arnautoff’s contribution to the Coit Tower mural series is titled, City Life (Click here for a YouTube video of the mural), a vibrant depiction of street life in San Francisco during the 1930s. As with most of the other works in the tower, City Life was a fresco mural painted on wet lime plaster - and it displays all of the qualities of a fine mural painting done in that technique. As much as I venerate Arnautoff’s fresco murals - and he painted a number of them, it is his oil paintings that I am truly passionate about, and those on view at the Helfen gallery are superlative examples of the modernist master’s power.

That the very first WPA project put artists to work creating monumental murals at Coit Tower speaks volumes about where America is today as a nation. Almost no one, not even professionals in the arts community, can imagine a colossal public art project being mounted at the present time - yet in my opinion such a project is more than feasible.

[ Unjust Punishment - Francis De Erdely. Mixed media on illustration board. 1950. Click here for a larger view. ]

I have to admit knowing next to nothing about Francis De Erdely prior to attending the opening at Spencer Jon Helfen Fine Arts, but what an introduction I received! I am eternally grateful to Mr. Helfen, not only for bringing the commanding works of De Erdely to my attention - but also for placing his works before the general public.

A centerpiece of the show, De Erdely’s Unjust Punishment is a modernist tour de force, a masterwork that alludes to all the world’s suffering - while still being an allegorical statement against McCarthyism, the anti-communist witch-hunts that swept the U.S. during the 1950s. The mixed media painting on illustration board depicts two crucified men, and the work has all the appearance of a stained glass window. While the painting is clearly figurative in nature, it freely incorporates aspects of cubism and abstraction, an approach De Erdely increasingly adopted in the later half of his life. That fact notwithstanding, De Erdely still ended up persona non grata in an art world that was to become wholly given to pure non-objective abstraction. I am left wondering if the broken men on their crosses in part serve as a metaphor for the realist artist abandoned for the sake of the "next big thing" in a fickle art world.

Francis De Erdely (1904-1959) was born in Hungary in 1904, and grew up during the ravages of the first World War. In the aftermath of that conflagration his country moved ever rightward, until a homegrown fascist movement developed that would eventually ally Hungary to Nazi Germany. As a young artist De Erdely was on a collision course with the Hungarian right for having depicted the atrocities of World War I in his paintings and sketches. He was also evidently supportive of the Spanish Republic and its struggle against fascism, creating sketches that revealed his sympathies but further provoked Hungary’s right-wing. Under pressure from Nazi Germany, Hungary joined the Axis powers in 1940, and De Erdely was apparently banished from his homeland during that period. Ultimately he would make his way to the United States, living for a short time in New York before finally making the city of Los Angeles his home in 1944. De Erdely became the dean of the Pasadena Art Institute School from 1944 to 1946, and he taught at the University of Southern California from 1945 until he passed away in 1959.

[ Oil painting by Francis De Erdely. Title unknown - circa late 1930s. While not in the Helfen exhibit, this painting of unemployed workers at a soup kitchen is a good example of the artist’s early social realism. ]

De Erdely’s early paintings were similar to Victor Arnautoff’s in that they were straightforward works of social observation. De Erdely was particularly fascinated with the underclass he discovered in Los Angeles, choosing them as his most consistently painted subject. He came to imbue his works with abstract sensibilities, but never abandoned his predilection for a humanist social realism. Daily Bread, his 1945 painting of a worker at rest, has an almost biblical quality about it, exemplifying the artist’s deep compassion for working people.

The works of Victor Arnautoff and Francis De Erdely make the Helfen show unusually rewarding, but then the entire exhibit is noteworthy. Arnautoff and De Erdely provide us with examples of a humanistic art at once accessible, anti-elitist, and given towards speaking clearly and directly to an audience. In all honesty, what I found so refreshing about the exhibit is that it gives insight into what figurative art was like before being contaminated by postmodernism. The paintings in the Helfen exhibit are devoid of irony, shock value, and vulgarity; they unabashedly pursue beauty and universality, and best of all - you do not need reams of mounted wall text to understand them. I am not at all saying that today’s artists should simply use the California Modernist school as a template to be replicated, but I do believe that a full understanding of and appreciation for California Modernism can serve as an important springboard for artists envisioning how art might advance into the 21st century.

Gallery Selections of Important California Modernist Paintings & Sculpture. Now running at Spencer Jon Helfen Fine Arts until March 28, 2009.

"We Have Real People Out of Work"

"We have real people out of work right now and putting $50 million in the NEA and pretending that's going to save jobs as opposed to putting $50 million in a road project is disingenuous." Thus spoke Georgia’s Republican Senator, Jack Kingston on February 5, 2009, on the subject of President Obama’s economic recovery plan, now being debated in the U.S. Senate. Apparently there are many, both in and out of Congress, who do not view artists as "real people."

The numbers of "real people out of work right now" in the field of the arts is growing exponentially. In an Associated Press article titled, Economic meltdown takes toll on performing arts, AP reporter Gillian Flaccus notes: "From Baltimore to Detroit to Pasadena, venerable performing arts institutions are laying off performers, cutting programming, canceling seasons and doing without new sets and live music. Some are closing down completely. (....) Bob Lynch, president and CEO of the national nonprofit Americans for the Arts, says about 10,000 arts organizations nationwide - about 10 percent of the total - have shut down or stand on the verge of collapse. 'It’s the worst I’ve seen it,' Lynch says."

Representative Jack Kingston does not stand alone, he is but the tip of a spear wielded by political reactionaries who are bent on eliminating all government funding of the arts. On February 6, 2009, as part of its deliberations over the economic recovery plan, the U.S. Senate approved an amendment by Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma. Coburn’s amendment reads in part; "None of the amounts appropriated or otherwise made available by this Act may be used for any casino or other gambling establishment, aquarium, zoo, golf course, swimming pool, stadium, community park, museum, theater, art center, and highway beautification project." If Coburn’s amendment language is incorporated into the final version of the bill, then arts groups will be barred from receiving any funds from the stimulus package.

Coburn’s amendment clearly is an attack upon the arts in America, and it passed a Senate vote by a margin of 73 to 24. But in advance of your cursing Senate Republicans, dear reader, please consider this; the Coburn amendment passed because of the votes it received from prominent Democratic Senators like Dianne Feinstein of California, Chuck Schumer of New York, Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, and a number of other Democratic Senators.

William Ivey, as head of the arts transition team for the new administration, advised President Obama that "several hundred million dollars" would be needed to provide proper funding for the arts across the United States. I would agree with Ivey on such an amount, but only as a minimum starting figure. Nonetheless, Obama ignored Ivey’s recommendation, proposing instead that $50 million out of the $819 billion stimulus package - or .06 percent of the overall package - be allotted for arts funding, and now even that figure is subject to further reduction.

William Ivey has expressed dismay over insinuations "that an arts worker is not a real worker, and that a carpenter who pounds nails framing a set for an opera company is a less-real carpenter than one who pounds nails framing a house." I am in full agreement with that sentiment, and challenge the arts community to become active in its own defense. I urge readers to send e-mails to Congress expressing disapproval of the Senate anti-arts Coburn amendment (Americans for the Arts have set up a web page for just this purpose), and encourage one and all to sign the 1% Campaign petition, which calls on the Obama administration to create an Arts Stimulus Plan.

[ UPDATE: The U.S. Senate passed its version of a stimulus bill on Feb. 10, 2009, it includes Sen. Tom Coburn’s anti-arts amendment - which the House version does not contain. The bill now goes to a House-Senate conference committee, which will negotiate a series of compromises. It remains to be seen if Coburn’s amendment will be stripped from the final bill.]

Charles White: Let The Light Enter

In April of 1967 the Heritage Gallery of Los Angeles published Images of Dignity, a monograph on the life and work of the great African American artist Charles White (1918-1979). I acquired a copy of the book just a year later when I was fifteen-years-old, the hardback volume providing one of my first insights into the works of White, American social realism, and the very idea of political engagement in modern American art. I have no hesitation in crediting White as a major influence in my life as an artist.

Opening this past January 10, and running until March 7, 2009, New York’s Michael Rosenfeld Gallery presents the important retrospective - Charles White: Let The Light Enter, Major Drawings, 1942-1970. The gallery’s biography on White opens with the following quote from the artist, which makes clear why he was such an influence upon me and why I continue to hold him in such high esteem:

"I am interested in the social, even the propaganda, angle in painting; but I feel that the job of everyone in a creative field is to picture the whole scene. . . I am interested in creating a style that is much more powerful, that will take in the technical end and at the same time will say what I have to say. Paint is the only weapon I have with which to fight what I resent. If I could write, I would write about it. If I could talk, I would talk about it. Since I paint, I must paint about it."

I will mostly dispense with listing the biographical details and accomplishments of Mr. White since the artist himself wrote eloquently of his life and times in an autobiography that now appears on the Charles White Archive website. Instead I am going to focus on two aspects of White’s career that have considerable relevance to the present: his relationship to the Works Progress Administration in the U.S. during the Depression Era, and his connection to the socially conscious Mexican Muralist Movement of the same period - which has been another source of endless inspiration for me. In light of discussions on the possibility of there being a new federal arts program under the Obama administration, White’s overwhelmingly positive experience with the WPA provides food for thought, as does his having found common cause with the Mexican school of socially engaged art.

[ Awaken from the Unknowing - Charles White. Ink and Wolff crayon on paper. 1961. In this drawing White implores the viewer to read, knowing that literacy is essential to the people’s advancement. Image courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery.]

White was a 20-year-old living in Chicago, Illinois, when in 1938 he was employed by the Works Progress Administration and its Federal Art Project (FAP) Easel Painting Division, which was no small matter since until that time the young artist barely managed to survive by doing odd jobs - when he could find them. In a 1965 oral history interview conducted for the Smithsonian Institute’s Archives of American Art, White credited the FAP program with having enabled him to survive as an artist through very hard times. He also recognized the program for having expanded his range of artistic skills and knowledge, commenting that the FAP was "almost a school." White said the following in his autobiography concerning having worked in the FAP:

"Looking back at my three years on the project, I see it was a tremendous step for me to be able to paint full time, be paid for it, although the pay was the bare minimum of unemployment relief. The most wonderful thing for me was the feeling of cooperation with other artists, of mutual help instead of competitiveness, and of cooperation between the artists and the people. It was in line with what I had always hoped to do as an artist, namely paint things pertaining to the real everyday life of people, and for them to see and enjoy. It was also a thrill for me to see so many accomplished artists at work, and to be able to learn from them."

White eventually switched from the FAP’s Easel Division to its Mural Department, where he learned the basic skills needed to create monumental mural works. In 1939 FAP gave White the responsibility of creating a large mural for the Chicago Public Library. He chose for his mural the theme of outstanding African American leaders, and so painted Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, George Washington Carver, Marian Anderson, and Booker T. Washington. Today the 5’ x 12’ oil on canvas mural hangs in the Law Library of the Howard University School of Law in Washington, D.C. Creating murals was a lifelong passion for White, and my home city of Los Angeles is blessed with the very last one he painted - a work produced in 1978 and located at the Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Exposition Park Branch of the L.A. Public Library.

Here it is necessary to mention White’s relationship to the Mexican school - that fusion of muralism, printmaking, and easel painting driven by social concerns. "Los Tres Grandes", the three greats of Mexican mural painting: José Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, and David Alfaro Siqueiros, had all visited the United States by the early 1930’s. In the wake of their U.S. visits they left behind a number of fabulous public murals, but also an enthusiastic network of American artists they had influenced through workshops, lectures, collaborations, and direct mentoring.

In 1941 White met and married Elizabeth Catlett, a remarkable artist in her own right. The two traveled to Mexico City in 1946, where they created prints with El Taller de Gráfica Popular (TGP - Popular Graphic Arts Workshop, founded in 1937), the foremost print collective in the country at the time. It was at the TGP that White learned the art of lithography, which became an enduring passion for him. At the workshop he met and worked with the likes of Diego Rivera, Pablo O’Higgins, and Leopoldo Méndez. In White’s own words, "One of the honors of which I am most proud is that of having been elected an honorary member of the Taller." Catlett also did several of her most memorable prints while working at the TGP; and some of the collective’s prints, including works by Catlett and Méndez, made their way into Gouge - the Los Angeles Hammer Museum’s stunning exhibit on printmaking in the 20th century (now showing until Feb. 8, 2009).

[ Dreams Deferred - Charles White. Ink and Wolff crayon on paper. 1969. The title of this drawing refers to the 1951 poem by African American poet, Langston Hughes - What Happens to a Dream Deferred? Image courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery.]

During their sojourn in Mexico City, White and Catlett were invited to stay at the home of David Alfaro Siqueiros, where they lodged in the top floor of the muralist’s residence. White’s time in Mexico was revelatory, providing him the confirmation that his chosen path in art was the correct one to take. He felt kinship with the radical populism of the Mexican artists, whose fiery works embodied the very idea of social realism in art. White and Catlett would divorce in 1948: she stayed in Mexico for good, while he moved to New York City. There he began to associate with like-minded artists such as Antonio Frasconi, Leonard Baskin, Philip Evergood, William Gropper, Moses and Raphael Soyer, and other giants in American social realism. Eventually Mr. White settled in the city of Los Angeles, where he became an influential drawing teacher at Otis Art Institute.

What I always found so impressive about White was that he never abandoned his artistic vision in order to follow the dictates of what was fashionable. Despite the ascendancy and near total dominance of abstract art in the 1950s, followed by the successions of Pop, Minimalism, and all the vacuities of Postmodernism - White remained true to his style of figurative social realism. Part of his memoirs recount his lonely isolated struggle in the 50s against abstraction, of "going against the tide of what everyone was claiming to be 'new' and 'the future'", and we are all the richer for White’s perseverance.

But White’s courage went far beyond his flying in the face of what was trendy in the art world. He came to reject careerism in art, regarding celebrity as anathema to the higher ideals of art. The spirit found in the following passage of his memoirs should be held aloft as a banner by those artists and their supporters who ardently believe in art as a tool for social transformation;

"I no longer have my hopes and aspirations tied up with becoming a 'success' in the market sense. I have had a measure of success in exhibits, some prizes and awards, although not as much as I might have gotten had there not been certain 'difficulties' presented by my speaking as part of the Negro people and the working class. Getting a marketplace success or recognition by art connoisseurs is no longer my major concern as an artist. My major concern is to get my work before common, ordinary people; for me to be accepted as a spokesman for my people; for my work to portray them better, and to be rich and meaningful to them. A work of art was meant to belong to people, not to be a single person's private possession. Art should take its place as one of the necessities of life, like food, clothing and shelter."

Charles White: Let The Light Enter, Major Drawings, 1942-1970, at the Michael Rosenfeld Gallery. January 10 - March 7, 2009.

Funding the Arts: "The Audacity of Pork"

$50 million in funding for the National Endowment for the Arts was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives on Jan. 29, 2009, as part of its passing President Obama’s $819 billion economic "stimulus bill" - the so-called American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

President Obama had met with Republicans in the House prior to the vote, making concessions to them in an attempt to get his stimulus bill passed. One such compromise was the killing of $200 million in appropriations from the bill for improvements to the crumbling 1,000-acre National Mall in Washington, D.C., the home to the Washington Monument and the Jefferson and Lincoln memorials. Newsweek magazine ran a July, 2008 story on the Mall’s scandalous state of disrepair that quoted the National Park Service saying a renovation of the Mall would cost "an estimated $350 to $500 million."

Despite the concessions, the House vote was 244 to 188 - with not a single Republican casting a yes vote. The bill now moves to the Senate, where Republicans have targeted the NEA funding for termination, as well as the $150 million appropriated for funding the Smithsonian Institution - the nation’s most important cultural network of museums and research centers. ABC News reported that Obama’s response to Republican intransigence regarding his stimulus bill was the following comment; "I hope that we can continue to strengthen this plan before it gets to my desk." The president’s remark could very well be interpreted as a willingness on his part to see NEA and Smithsonian Institution funding removed from the stimulus bill. We shall see.

In December of last year, I made the following observation of Obama on this web log; "If he were to mount an effort at massive arts spending, I can imagine the organized right blocking his every attempt at implementing the policy for multiple reasons, and with his striving for a bipartisan approach to governance, it seems unlikely he would take a combative stance." That very scenario now seems to be playing out before us.

Former chairman of the San Francisco Republican Party, Arthur Bruzzone, summed up rightist opposition to stimulus bill funding of the NEA, calling it; "the audacity of pork." Conservative pundit and Republican strategist Michael Reagan, wrote an article for the GOPUSA website that criticized the stimulus package, referring to the NEA as; "hardly an engine for creating employment for the unemployed. About the only jobs it might create would be for the bureaucrats who would oversee the grant or an artist or two who specialize in exhibiting jars of urine containing a crucifix as their contributions to the nation's culture." While the NEA is certainly not beyond being criticized, Reagan’s remark is nothing more than philistinism.

It is disheartening to see the National Mall, the NEA, and the Smithsonian Institution being treated so shabbily. These national treasures should not be considered bargaining chips in someone’s political gamesmanship, and they most certainly should not be viewed as recipients of "wasteful pork barrel spending." When those who dare call themselves "patriots", display such mendacious and disparaging attitudes towards the best of American culture - barbarism will be found just around the corner.

Arts Stimulus Plan Petition

A petition calling on the new Obama administration to create a stimulus package for the arts was launched on January 20, 2009, by the Foreign Policy In Focus (FPIF) Washington D.C. think tank in alliance with the Split this Rock Poetry Festival.

The editor of the D.C. think tank, John Feffer, along with Split this Rock member, Melissa Tuckey, expressed the ideas behind the initiative in a collaborative article they wrote titled, From Arms to Art, which appears on the FPIF website. The commentary opens with the following statement: "The United States is the largest exporter of arms in the world. Imagine what would happen if we became the largest exporter of the arts instead." The call by Feffer and Tuckey goes on to state that the "Congress is debating an $800 billion stimulus package that many have compared to FDR’s Works Progress Administration (WPA)", and that the FPIF/Split this Rock appeal is "asking that 1% of the stimulus package be used in support of the arts." In part the article reads:

"To stimulate the economy, we need to rely on some of the most stimulating minds in our country: the artists. With their vision, they can help us envision a different future. But in this global economy, we can't do it alone. We must think and act across borders. By devoting 1% of the stimulus package to the arts — and incorporating a strong global dimension to the funding — we can revive the U.S. economy and the U.S. global reputation. Ham-fisted propaganda and slick advertising aren't going to do the trick. We need authentic voices, provocative works that reflect the true diversity of this country, and powerful visions that can build bridges and tear down walls. Join our campaign by signing our petition. Let's not just stimulate the economy. Let's stimulate our imagination."

I critically support the "One Percent for the Arts Campaign" petition drive as launched by Foreign Policy In Focus and Split this Rock Poetry Festival. I have already signed my name to the document and I encourage all arts professionals and their supporters to do the same. The petition is located at: www.ipetitions.com/petition/artsstimulus.

Free Admission to American Museums!

I am sure many will favorably view French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s recent announcement that all museums in France will soon be free for school teachers and for visitors under 25 - but careful scrutiny of the plan should be made before praising it. This story is especially relevant to the American arts community, which fully expects a sweeping new national arts policy from the incoming Obama White House.

On January 13, 2009, President Sarkozy announced his arts plan in an address made before members of France’s cultural sector. The plan, starting April 4, 2009, not only gives teachers and the young free entry to all museums, it pledges an annual 100 million euros ($161 million) for the operation and maintenance of national museums and heritage sites, and the formation of a new advisory group dedicated to promoting artistic creation. Also included in Sarkozy’s plan is the building of a new national museum - the Museum of French History.

To the casual observer the Sarkozy plan seems enlightened, but the French President may have an ulterior political motive for making his announcement at this particular time. That it took two years into his presidency before he came up with a serious national plan for the arts speaks volumes. On the one hand I see the project as insufficient - why not free admission to French museums for all the French people and not just a select demographic? The entire plan strikes me as a strategy designed to turn around plummeting approval ratings, particularly amongst the young. On the other hand, I wish that American governmental arts policy could be so advanced!

President Sarkozy’s national arts plan is the type of announcement that will no doubt make the arts community in the U.S. speculate as to why such a program could not be enacted under the new administration of Barack Obama. Why not indeed. America’s museums are not just repositories of the nation’s cultural heritage; their holdings give evidence to the greatness of a people, and as such, the people should have complete access to the nation’s treasures - free of charge.

On May 10, 1939, a crowd of 6,000 gathered at New York’s Museum of Modern Art to celebrate the museum’s tenth anniversary and reopening at its new facilities. Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed the multitudes by radio broadcast - saying in part the following:

"Art in America has always belonged to the people and has never been the property of an academy or a class. The great Treasury projects, through which our public buildings are being decorated, are an excellent example of the continuity of this tradition. The Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration is a practical relief project which also emphasizes the best tradition of the democratic spirit. The W.P.A. artist, in rendering his own impression of things, speaks also for the spirit of his fellow countrymen everywhere. I think the W.P.A. artist exemplifies with great force the essential place which the arts have in a democratic society such as ours."

And what would FDR think of MoMA charging $20 for a general admission ticket during today’s hard economic times? What would he say about America’s students, the elderly, and those living on fixed incomes, the underemployed, the unemployed - the employed for goodness sakes! - being unable to visit their local museums because of high ticket prices? Perhaps he would have to rethink his position about American art not being "the property of an academy or a class." I realize that most U.S. museums now offer free admission at least one day each month, usually underwritten by this or that major corporate sponsor, but that clearly is not enough - especially when compared to developments in France.

As exemplified by reports from The New York Times and ARTINFO, most press accounts of Sarkozy’s announced arts plan have been perfunctory, completely without background information, context, comment or analysis. They read like republished press releases from President Sarkozy’s office. Sarkozy’s announcement is not entirely a surprise to me. In January, 2005, I twice reported on the activities of Louvre Pour Tous (Louvre For All), a grassroots movement in France that seeks the "cultural democratization" of French cultural institutions and has as its major demand, the abolishment of all admission prices to the Louvre.

On Jan. 14, 2009, Louvre Pour Tous posted an article on its website that stated part of Sarkozy’s current plan had in reality already been "decided and made public one year ago", contending that at a 2008 meeting of France’s Council of Ministers, Sarkozy’s Culture Minister Christine Albanel had announced teachers would be exempt from paying museum entry fees. As a matter of fact, the Reuters news agency reported a year ago that starting Jan. '08, "French national museums including the Louvre in Paris will let in many visitors free in the coming months", and that "some national museums will offer completely free admission to their permanent collections, while others will offer it to those under 26, one evening a week." Granted this experiment in free admission to France’s museums only lasted for a six-month period, but why did the Sarkozy government halt the program in June '08, only to propose a more robust scheme to start this coming April 2009? What assurances exist that Sarkozy will not also terminate this latest program? Only the demands of a mobilized citizenry!

Sarkozy’s proposed advisory group on the arts ostensibly has as its mission the creation of incentives and a supportive social environment for artistic production, interestingly enough, Sarkozy will head the new council himself, along with Culture Minister Christine Albanel and film producer Marin Karmintz. Rather than simply a body set up to help implement government arts policy, the new council has the appearance of being a personal tool of Monsieur Sarkozy. Likewise, his projected Museum of French History appears to be nothing more than a vanity project meant to stamp his legacy on the vistas of Paris. As the French historian Alain Decaux so eloquently put it: "I don’t see the use, quite simply, because Paris is one immense museum of the history of France."

[ Presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy, at their joint press conference, Paris, July 25, 2008. Obama commented "I can’t imagine somebody who better captures the enthusiasm and energy of France than Sarkozy." Obama went on to say that Sarkozy was the reason Americans decided to call "French fries 'French fries' again" - a remark that referred to the decision of the U.S. Congress to rename "French Fries" on the Congressional cafeteria menu to "Freedom Fries", as an expression of anger over former French President Jacques Chirac’s opposition to the 2003 U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. Sarkozy backed the Bush invasion of Iraq. AP Photo - Remy de la Mauviniere.]

The political relationship between Sarkozy and Obama is worth examining in light of Sarkozy’s arts proposal and the high expectations the American arts community has for an Obama arts plan. What seems obvious to me is that Sarkozy’s project is a response, both to public pressure and perceptions, as well as to shifting political/economic realities, i.e., the collapsing market. Obama’s arts plan will likewise be similarly shaped - which is something the American arts community needs to understand if it is to have any influence whatsoever upon the incoming Obama administration’s arts policy.

Sarkozy’s right-wing centrism dovetails with President-elect Obama’s centrism. Despite the shrill and preposterous accusations from the American right-wing that Obama is a wild-eyed socialist, the President-elect is not going to govern from the left. He is a so-called "pragmatist" who will maneuver the ship of state in a direction that is neither liberal nor conservative, but a course nevertheless designed to guard the interests of the capitalist system, in other words, Obama will now be CEO of America, Inc. All good things are not simply going to flow from the White House - they must be demanded, insisted upon - just as workers pressure management for better working conditions when they go out on strike.

If American artists want a WPA-style federal arts program for the 21st century that will provide employment for thousands of cultural workers, if they want the nation’s museums to be free of all admission charges, if they want the government to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into expanding arts and culture programs instead of pouring the nation’s wealth into the rat hole of endless war - then American artists are going to have to challenge the CEO of America, Inc. to deliver the goods.

A New WPA Arts Program?

In her December 19, 2008, article for the New York Times, After a Capitalist W.P.A., What Next?, Roberta Smith opined about the impact the severe economic downturn is having on the arts community. "What will the art world be like a year from now?" she asked rhetorically, before informing us that things will essentially remain the same, only "smaller, leaner and, many assume, cleaner." That is little more than wishful thinking on Ms. Smith’s part, seeing as how the recent financial collapse is spiraling into a full-blown depression. But it is the following passage from Smith’s article that I found distressing:

"(....) the booming art market of the past seven or eight years has amounted to an immense capitalist-driven Works Progress Administration. As with the real W.P.A., it enabled all kinds of artists to support themselves while making art, much of which was forgettable. It became relatively easy to be an artist or dealer. Now things will be different. We’re on the brink of a new phase, teetering between dread and a perverse kind of excitement. A winnowing will undoubtedly begin."

How does one even begin to argue against the nonsense put forward in such a statement? It defies all rational thought to equate the WPA of the Great Depression era with those layers of the contemporary art world who have been drunk on cash and celebrity - a money cult if there ever was one. And the assertion that it has been "relatively easy to be an artist or dealer" these last eight years is similarly preposterous. In discussing the possibility of a new Federal Arts Project like the WPA, what is required at this juncture is not flippant banter but thought-provoking analysis and discussion.

[ Shall The Artist Survive? Artist/Designer unknown. 1936 poster produced by the WPA’s Federal Art Project, announcing a forumn on the status of artists during the Great Depression. FAP Director Holger Cahill was a featured speaker at the free event. Poster from the Library of Congress collection. ]

Until just recently the American arts community has mostly ignored the WPA arts programs - now it is time to open the books and study our past in order to clear a way to our future. A good starting point to learn about WPA arts programs is Lincoln Cushing’s outstanding essay, Privatising the Commons: The Commodification of New Deal Public Art, written for the AIGA website. Cushing’s article reads like a basic primer on the WPA arts programs, but his scholarship is impeccable. Here is an excerpt:

"The deliberately public nature of WPA was a grand experiment, not just in putting artists to work, but in the democratization of the arts themselves. Fine artists worked alongside communities all over the country, reimaging the iconography of the egalitarian principles that this country believes it was founded upon. The process was participatory and inclusive, the results free to the public."

In 1935 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt established the Works Progress Administration. Federal Project Number One, or simply Federal One, was the arts program component of the WPA. It consisted of five key divisions, each with its own director - the Federal Art Project (FAP), the Federal Theatre Project, the Federal Writers Project, the Federal Music Project, and the Historical Records Survey. After only one year in existence, Federal One had employed around 40,000 artists across the United States.

[ Artist Richard Floethe designed this silk-screen print for an "Exhibition of Oil Paintings by Artists in the Easel Division of the W.P.A. Federal Art Project." The exhibit was held at the WPA’s Federal Art Project Gallery in New York City. Year unknown. Poster from the Library of Congress collection.]

The FAP alone employed 5,300 visual artists at its zenith in 1936, and the artists working under FAP’s Director Holger Cahill were engaged in a number of endeavors. FAP oversaw the creation of more than 2,500 murals in schools, workplaces, libraries, hospitals and other public locations. It directed a painting division where professionals created some 108,000 easel paintings documenting all aspects of American life. FAP ran a prolific poster division that created around 240,000 prints. There were many talented artists employed by FAP, and quite a number of them went on to become notables, such as Thomas Hart Benton, Stuart Davis, Arshile Gorky, Philip Guston, Jacob Lawrence, Jackson Pollock, Ben Shahn, John Sloan, Raphael Soyer, Grant Wood, and Ivan Albright.

Will the Obama administration offer even a substantially scaled-down WPA-like arts program for today, let alone provide any significant budget increases for already existing arts programs? The only chance for that will come if and when consistent demands are made upon him to do so. On January 8, 2009, President-elect Obama gave a major speech on his economic stimulus plan, the so-called American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan. In his address Obama said the following: "And as I announced yesterday, we will launch an unprecedented effort to eliminate unwise and unnecessary spending… We cannot have a solid recovery if our people and our businesses don’t have confidence that we’re getting our fiscal house in order." Obama made clear that his economic stimulus package was "not just another public works program", insisting that his objective "is not to create a slew of new government programs, but a foundation for long-term economic growth."

[ An anonymous artist depicted a raised mailed fist in this silk-screen poster designed for the Federal Art Project. The print announced a city wide forum in Des Moines, Iowa, on the subject of "Civil Liberties in War Times." The featured speaker at the event was Max Lerner. Year unknown. Poster from the Library of Congress collection.]

Every artist and arts supporter knows that funding for the arts, whether on the federal, state, or local level, is always the first thing to be axed from government budgets, usually in the erroneous belief that such monies are being spent unwisely and unnecessarily. Based on the above comments, I have no confidence that Obama will substantially increase arts funding or expand arts programs. In a speech delivered in 1939, FAP’s Director Holger Cahill made the following observations regarding Federal Project Number One:

"The Project has discovered that such a simple matter as finding employment for the artist in his hometown has been of the greatest importance. It has, for one thing, helped to stem the cultural erosion which in the past two decades has drawn most of America's art talent to a few large cities. It has brought the artist closer to the interests of a public which needs him, and which is now learning to understand him. And it has made the artist more responsive to the inspiration of the country, and through this the artist is bringing every aspect of American life into the currency of art."

Contemporary artists should pay close attention to Cahill’s words, especially his insistence that the FAP "brought the artist closer to the interests of a public which needs him." There was a time when American artists enthusiastically integrated themselves into the broad currents of U.S. society, taking inspiration from the people and working hard to incorporate art into daily life. That is largely the legacy of Federal Project Number One. Detractors will no doubt call me old-fashioned, but I think that is a spirit to recapture.

Obama: "Cultural Shift from the Top"?

A number of arts advocacy groups across the United States believe that the incoming Obama administration possesses an innovative government plan for the arts. In part this is based upon the fact that the Obama campaign publicly released its "Platform In Support Of The Arts" nearly a year before the national elections. Conversely the McCain campaign made public its arts platform - a four sentence long document - just 33 days before the elections. However, a number of questions are raised by a close reading of the Obama arts platform, not the least of which involves the uncertainty that any of it will actually be implemented. Maintaining the occupation of Iraq and escalating the war in Afghanistan will be costly propositions for the new administration, and coupled with what the incoming President himself has called "the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression", it seems unlikely the arts will be anything but a low priority.

The Los Angeles based arts advocacy group, Arts For LA!, represents a good case in point when it comes to overly optimistic Obama supporters. In the organization’s December 9, 2008 newsletter, under the heading of a "Cultural Shift from the Top", it was excitedly noted that; "Last Sunday on Meet the Press, President-elect Obama spoke about his plans to address the country's economic crisis, foreign policy, tax cuts, and his intention to 'open the White House up to inspire innovation and imagination.' He wants to remind people that 'the White House is the people's house.' He also intends to host poets, artists and musicians because 'art, culture, science is the essence of what makes America special.'"

Arts For LA! should be reminded that "The People’s House" is a colloquial term that has long referred to the White House. What is more, the conservative administrations of Nixon, Reagan, and George W. Bush have all spoken of the White House as "The People’s House", so the designation as used by Mr. Obama does not necessarily indicate a new, groundbreaking stance. While the Bush administration represented the most retrograde policies, it cynically understood the arts as part of state craft. In 2006 the first lady launched the Bush State Department’s, Global Cultural Initiative (GCI), a well financed program of international cultural exchanges backed by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Film Institute, and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. GCI is the type of arts program that Mr. Obama may well feel comfortable maintaining and expanding; which would represent yet another instance of outright continuity with the Bush administration.

Tom Brokaw conducted the Meet the Press interview with the President-elect, and the brief dialog concerning cultural matters that Arts For LA! found so stirring follows in its entirety (from the official transcript);

MR. BROKAW: "Who are the kinds of artists that you would like to bring to the White House?"

PRES.-ELECT OBAMA: "Thinking about the diversity of our culture and, and inviting jazz musicians and classical musicians and poetry readings in the White House so that, once again, we appreciate this incredible tapestry that's America. I - you know, that, I think, is, is going to be incredibly important, particularly because we're going through hard times. And, historically, what has always brought us through hard times is that national character, that sense of optimism, that willingness to look forward, that, that sense that better days are ahead. I think that our art and our culture, our science, you know, that's the essence of what makes America special, and, and we want to project that as much as possible in the White House."

Inviting artists to perform at the White House does not sound like a government arts program - not by a long shot; and Mr. Obama’s remark about how "our art and culture" represents the "essence of what makes America special" is facile rhetoric utilized by every politician no matter what their party affiliation.

In Dec. 2007 President Bush signed an appropriations bill that provided $144.7 million for the National Endowment for the Arts for fiscal year 2008. It was the largest funding increase for the NEA in 28 years. Does Mr. Obama intend to increase that expenditure? He has stated that he "supports increased funding for the NEA", but by how much? The highest level of funding for the NEA came during the Clinton years in 1992 - $175.9 million. Will Obama top that allocation? Will he work towards reinstating NEA grants for individual artists? - a program that was terminated under Clinton’s tenure in 1994 due to attacks from the right wing. Rather than eagerly awaiting the next pronouncement from Obama, the arts community should be organizing itself to make specific demands upon the incoming administration.

Laura Zucker of the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, wrote a guest column for Arts For LA! on the subject of the arts in hard economic times. In the opening paragraph of her article titled, "Can the arts weather the recession tsunami?" Ms. Zucker wrote; "Every challenge presents new opportunities. Or as Rahm Emanuel, President-elect Obama's new chief of staff, said in an interview recently, 'Rule One: Never allow a crisis to go to waste. They are opportunities to do big things.'"

Whether she is in Rahm’s camp or speaks solely out of political naïveté, Ms. Zucker’s citation of Obama's chief of staff is revealing. Since Ms. Zucker choose to bring up Rahm Emanuel, allow me to point out a few facts about his career. Emanuel was Obama’s first appointee, a pick that raised eyebrows among progressives given that Emanuel was a leading member of the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) - a grouping within the Democratic Party known by critics as the "Republican Wing of the Democratic Party." Rahm not only backed the congressional resolution that authorized military force against Iraq, he supported the 2003 invasion of that country. In a January 2005 interview with Tim Russert on Meet the Press, Rahm said that if he could do it all over again, he would still back an invasion of Iraq - even knowing that the country possessed no weapons of mass destruction.

As head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006, Rahm worked to keep anti-Iraq-war candidates off the Democratic slate. His belligerent attitude and right-wing stance on foreign policy matters has earned him the nickname of "Rahm-bo." A Nov 5, 2008 report from Reuters quoted Republican strategist John Feehery, rather gleefully declaring that Rahm "is going to spend most of his time cracking Democratic heads, getting them to move from the left to the middle. Mr. Obama is going to need a bad cop to his good cop. Mr. Emanuel fills that role nicely." That same Reuters article quoted Kevin Smith, spokesman for House Republican Leader John Boehner, commenting that Rahm was "an ironic and controversial choice, to say the least, for a presidential candidate running on a promise to change Washington."

If the remark made about Emanuel in the Arts For LA! column seemed a bit incongruous, at least Ms. Zucker had the where-with-all to broach the subject of the depression era Works Progress Administration (WPA), and how we are in need of such a program today. President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the WPA in 1935, providing relief to over 8 million jobless Americans. A large portion of WPA funding went to painters, writers, actors, musicians, and directors, who were put to work on projects that enhanced the cultural heritage of the nation. But Zucker’s comment seems excessively optimistic;

"On the federal front, as discussions about big construction projects to generate jobs and stimulate the economy becomes (sic) a real strategy, let’s not forget the tremendous legacy of arts projects created through the WPA projects of the depression. How about including a mega-investment in the arts this time around as well?"

While I certainly welcome a WPA-style "mega-investment in the arts" providing work for thousands of artists in communities across the U.S., I am at a loss to think of a single reason why Obama would support such a program. At present he is under absolutely no political pressure to do so, and in any event his centrist predilections seem to bar such a contingency. If he were to mount an effort at massive arts spending, I can imagine the organized right blocking his every attempt at implementing the policy for multiple reasons, and with his striving for a bipartisan approach to governance, it seems unlikely he would take a combative stance. At any rate, Obama’s "Platform In Support Of The Arts" appears to be little more than a mix of volunteerism, corporate sponsorship, and a minimal amount of government spending. If we are to have a "mega-investment in the arts", it will only come about because the arts community and its allies apply unrelenting and effective pressure on the upcoming Obama administration.

To a large degree Roosevelt created the WPA in response to a mass-movement of workers, a situation Obama does not (yet) face. The economic collapse in the 1930s was so severe that it presented nothing less than the preconditions for revolt. Bands of organized looters stealing food became a nation-wide occurrence. "Unemployed Councils" provided direct material aid to tens of thousands of the unemployed, organizing them to fight for government relief, resist forced evictions and carry out rent strikes. By 1934 a huge wave of labor militancy had swept the nation, with strikes by hundreds of thousands of workers taking place from coast to coast. The circumstances described here only in part, forced FDR to implement massive emergency relief projects, including the Federal Art Project, which created over 5,000 jobs for artists.

For artists there are a great many parallels - and differences - to be found when comparing the Great Depression to our present situation, topics I will continue to examine on this web log. Currently there are very high expectations of changes taking place in our society, and when that frame of mind is shared by millions, societal transformation is close at hand. But individual leaders are not to be relied upon. Millions of people in motion are the engine of history - that is the only force capable of bringing about real change.

Obama’s Arts & Culture Policy

It is noteworthy that the upcoming administration of President-Elect Barack Obama is the first to present a detailed formal arts policy prior to inauguration. To foster debate, this article will reproduce in full, the Obama/Biden Platform In Support Of The Arts - with a link to the original .pdf document located on www.barackobama.com. I encourage a thorough reading of the platform, but also a vigorous debate of its various points.

An opportunity for a wide public examination and discussion of the Obama/Biden Arts Policy will avail itself on Thursday, November 20th, when Americans for the Arts host a live "webcast" conversation with Bill Ivey, former Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) during the Clinton administration and the current Chair of the Obama Arts & Culture Transition Team. Those living in the greater Los Angeles area can attend the free event at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica. Those who cannot attend may view the webcast from their home computer, after first becoming a member of Americans for the Arts. Details on registering for the event or watching the broadcast are available here. I plan on attending the Nov. 20th, Santa Monica event, and will follow up with a detailed report and critique of the Obama/Biden Platform In Support Of The Arts.

While the platform planks appear to be important first steps in resuscitating the Arts in America, they should not simply be accepted without critical analysis. I find several of the planks to be questionable, i.e., Private Partnerships, Cultural Diplomacy, and Health Care to Artists being the most glaring examples, and overall I believe the entire Platform In Support Of The Arts is wholly inadequate and in need of significant expansion.

When reviewing the Obama/Biden Platform In Support Of The Arts, one should keep in mind that the 2009 budget for the United States Department of Defense is $515.4 billion - up $5.7 billion from fiscal year 2008; whereas total NEA funding for fiscal 2008 came to $144.664 million. Granted, these figures are from a budget enacted by George W. Bush, but it is hard to imagine an Obama administration modifying such an imbalance - especially since it promises a "rebuilding" of the U.S. military and an escalation of the war in Afghanistan, all while the economy is teetering on depression.

Whatever one might think of Barack Obama being compared to Franklin D. Roosevelt, this much is undeniable - FDR’s sweeping New Deal reforms came about only as a result of massive public pressure from an electorate that demanded and struggled for deep and lasting transformation. No less so, Obama can only be compelled to pursue a progressive agenda through the unrelenting demands of a mobilized citizenry. As the great African American patriot Frederick Douglass once said, "Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will."

BARACK OBAMA AND JOE BIDEN:
CHAMPIONS FOR ARTS AND CULTURE
A PLATFORM IN SUPPORT OF THE ARTS

Reinvest in Arts Education: 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. Unfortunately, many school districts are cutting instructional time for art and music education. Barack Obama believes that the arts should be a central part of effective teaching and learning. 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." To support greater arts education, Obama will:

Expand Public/Private Partnerships Between Schools and Arts Organizations: Barack Obama will increase resources for the U.S. Department of Education’s Arts Education Model Development and Dissemination Grants, which develop public/private partnerships between schools and arts organizations. Obama will also engage the foundation and corporate community to increase support for public/private partnerships.

Create an Artist Corps: Barack Obama supports the creation of an "Artists Corps" of young artists trained to work in low-income schools and their communities. Studies in Chicago have demonstrated that test scores improved faster for students enrolled in low-income schools that link arts across the curriculum than scores for students in schools lacking such programs.

Publicly Champion the Importance of Arts Education: As president, Barack Obama will use the bully pulpit and the example he will set in the White House to promote the importance of arts and arts education in America. Not only is arts education indispensable for success in a rapidly changing, high skill, information economy, but studies show that arts education raises test scores in other subject areas as well.

Support Increased Funding for the NEA: Over the last 15 years, government funding for the National Endowment for the Arts has been slashed from $175 million annually in 1992 to $125 million today. Barack Obama supports increased funding for the NEA, the support of which enriches schools and neighborhoods all across the nation and helps to promote the economic development of countless communities.

Promote Cultural Diplomacy: American artists, performers and thinkers – representing our values and ideals – can inspire people both at home and all over the world. 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.

Attract Foreign Talent: The flipside to promoting American arts and culture abroad is welcoming members of the foreign arts community to America. Opening America’s doors to students and professional artists provides the kind of two-way cultural understanding that can break down the barriers that feed hatred and fear. As America tightened visa restrictions after 9/11, the world’s most talented students and artists, who used to come here, went elsewhere. Barack Obama will streamline the visa process to return America to its rightful place as the world’s top destination for artists and art students.

Provide Health Care to Artists: Finding affordable health coverage has often been one of the most vexing obstacles for artists and those in the creative community. Since many artists work independently or have non-traditional employment relationships, employer-based coverage is unavailable and individual policies are financially out of reach. Barack Obama’s plan will provide all Americans with quality, affordable health care. His plan includes the creation of a new public program that will allow individuals and small businesses to buy affordable health care similar to that available to federal employees. His plan also creates a National Health Insurance Exchange to reform the private insurance market and allow Americans to enroll in participating private plans, which would have to provide comprehensive benefits, issue every applicant a policy, and charge fair and stable premiums. For those who still cannot afford coverage, the government will provide a subsidy. His health plan will lower costs for the typical American family by up to $2,500 per year.

Ensure Tax Fairness for Artists: Barack Obama supports the Artist-Museum Partnership Act, introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT). The Act amends the Internal Revenue Code to allow artists to deduct the fair market value of their work, rather than just the costs of the materials, when they make charitable contributions.