“That so many elected American federal government officials [see] museums and theaters as comparable to golf courses and casinos reveals a lot about how the United States federal government views the purposes and value of the arts in American society,”
~Luann Jennings
As a soon-to-be graduate of an arts management program (fingers crossed!) and an artist, I experience a daily tug-of-war about being forced to advocate for the vital work that we do as artists, arts managers, arts advocates, arts patrons and donors, and arts lovers. The challenge of “defending” the arts in America, it appears to me, is uniquely guided by our “strong components of pragmatism, materialism and puritanical ideology, all of which devalue the arts,” as cited by Arnold Foster in Art and Society: Readings in the Sociology of the Arts. Because most Americans don’t value the arts as an inseparable, self-evident cultural raison d’etre, let’s take a look at five popular “arguments” in favor of the arts:
1. The Broccoli Argument: The arts are good for you. You should engage in artistic activity, by either directly participating in an artistic pursuit (e.g., playing a musical instrument, dancing, painting, etc.) or by attending arts events. This will make you smarter and more cultured and will make you appear more desirable to potential future mates. It shows you are–oh, I cringe at the word–artsy.
2. The Economic Argument: The arts and culture sectors create jobs. They bring money into neighborhoods and businesses (think theatre-goers with an appetite frequenting restaurants before shows, and maybe bars afterwards if the play is really shite). The arts also make money through ticket sales, memberships, grants, individuals and corporate sponsorship, among other avenues. Thanks to our friends at Americans for the Arts’ “What the Arts Does for America Economically” report, we know that there are approximately 100,000 nonprofit arts organizations in America, and that they’re spending $63.1 billion annually. There are more full-time jobs supported by the nonprofit arts organizations than are in accounting, public safety officers, even lawyers, and just slightly fewer than elementary school teachers. America’s nonprofit arts & culture industry generates $166.2 billion worth of economic activity annually, including 5.7 million jobs, generating $29.6 billion in government revenue, of which $12.6 billion is federal revenue.
TIME OUT. You read the numbers, right? So…Why’s Everybody Always Pickin’ on The Arts?!
3. The Art-for-Art’s Sake Argument: The Dryden Central School District in New York dedicates an entire department and a chunk of its website to the question (aimed at students, administrators and parents, no doubt): “Why Is Art Important?” The author of the reply, M. LoParco, tells us, “Today more than ever the arts are needed by our young people as a forum for safe expression, communication, exploration, imagination, and cultural and historical understanding.” Now, this goes beyond the art-for-art’s sake argument, but I think it’s sort of like Blackberry/PC users trying to argue with iPhone/Mac users about which is a better gadget, in that Mac users (in their unbridled expressions of technological superiority) operate under the assumption that Apple technology is just better. Then, Apple fanatics kindly work backwards from there, breaking down app-by-app that it’s silly for we archaic consumers to still crush on our Rasberries (as I refer to my red handheld). Likewise, “art-for-art’s sake” conversations in their many iterations are founded on the belief that art has always been and will and should always be. Many artists and arts managers are tired of arguing about why art is important. It just is.
4. The Arts Make You Smarter Argument: Michael Posner, a researcher at the University of Oregon, who studies the effects of music on attention, found “that in (…) students who showed motivation and creativity, training in the arts helped develop their attention and their intelligence.” The Dana Consortium began its research with the question, “Are smart people drawn to the arts or does arts training make people smarter?” Among the eight key findings, researchers found that “An interest in a performing art leads to a high state of motivation that produces the sustained attention necessary to improve performance and the training of attention that leads to improvement in other domains of cognition.” The lead researcher added that although there’s still work to be done, “We now have further reasons to believe that training in the arts has positive benefits for more general cognitive mechanisms.” FURTHER REASONS, ya’ll. Scientists keep being asked to justify and demystify what artists have always known: the arts are a powerful catalyst for fruitful, meaningful, challenging activity in both the brain and body. Bettina Korek, arts advocate and founder of ForYourArt, writes, “The idea that people will engage more if they can share what they think, becoming a part of the conversation, reflects an interesting problem for institutions. It is time that institutions engage in the dialogue about the most fundamental questions – What is art? Is art important? – using 21st century tools.” So, we know the arts make us smarter. Now what arts administrators must accept (Korek is challenging institutions, but I think individual artists and less formalized collectives should answer this call, too) is that we’ve got to convince the policy makers and change agents who can put that information to work with the proper human and financial resources, too.
Another aside. I’m not implying that all politicians/policy-makers are anti-arts. Former president John F. Kennedy once said, “If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.” Thanks for getting it, JFK. Or, in the words of Jay-Z, “let that b*tch breathe.”
5. The Art Fosters Mutual Understanding Argumentt: Geneva-based artist and arts manager, Ousmane Dia, tells us, “I am sure that only art will bring together all the peoples of the world.” The Singapore “for art’s sake” blog challenged artists to fill in the blank: “Singapore artists promise to _______ in 2010,” to which the artistic director of The Necessary Stage, Alvin Tan, responded, “Wishing for more arts writers; critics and academic reviewers. A performance journal led by an academic institution. Even more openness to experimental works, and a breakthrough with censorship policies.” Kenneth Kwok, theatre critic and editor at Flying Inkpot, replied:
“The arts community reuniting this year to speak up as advocates on issues was very heartening, regardless of the final decisions made by external authorities. I hope there will be more of such conversation platforms for artists across disciplines to come together, strengthen our sense of being a family with a common purpose, whatever our differences.”
What does all this talk about artists in Sinapore have to do with the arts fostering mutual understanding? Well, reading that particular blog gave me access to a lot of new information about Singapore that I might never have if it weren’t for the arts. I got a glimpse into their cultural policy through the voices of the artists whom these decisions directly impact. Some key points of interest to me: folks in Singapore are open (even if there’s hope for more openness) to “experimental works,” but censorship policies place barriers on art-making and artists. I also learned through the magic of the blogosphere (a new ecosystem of thoughts and ideas for me) that the arts community of Singapore is rallying to advocate with their governments for the arts just as we do in the U.S. I wonder if our peers at Americans for the Arts and the Future of Music Coalition could leverage this global movement for cultural policies that benefit artists and other cultural agents?
I’ll leave ya’ll with this: Are we, in America, “a family with a common purpose”?
Whatever your answer, is there room in this American family to acknowledge that the arts are as old or as young as human life on this planet and that one day soon, we should stop wasting artists’ and arts managers’ time finding and creating energy-sucking reports, evaluation tools and new articulations for arguing the “Case for Support of the Arts”?
Please. Stop picking on the arts. They’re the pineal gland, the “seat of the soul,” the third eye of our society. Let’s debate whether or not we should have a Ministry of Culture and who should run the NEA. Let’s talk about our national identity, if there is one, and how the arts and our cultural values shape that identity. Let’s pick apart the ways in which we create, support, view, participate in and are positively and negatively impacted by the arts and artists in this world that we share. But yo. Seriously. Like hip-hop scholar Joan Morgan, who asked her e-community of friends on Facebook to not hit her with a “Save Haiti” pillow, don’t hit me with a “Why are the arts important?” pillow anymore. The arts are the trend-setters and timekeepers, both the initiators and responders to cultural currents. You might not know it just yet, but you need the arts just as much as they need you. And, if you really think that you don’t, you should give me your cool iPhone with all of its artsy apps. I’ve really been wanting one.
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