Public Funding for the Arts; E. Dickerson

146 Public Funding for the Arts: Diamond or Daub? by Eugenie Dickerson T here are things that government should never touch-religion, free press, the arts. . . . I learned how badly bureau crats can mangle the last category when I served on an arts board, and because I respect the independence of the American mainstream to sift classical art from con art. All across the continent, the public questions the picks of tax-funded arts boards. New York City is the scene of bitter opposi tion to the sculpture "Tilted Arc." The 120 foot-long wall was hatched in the Federal Plaza in Manhattan in 1981 out of a Federal art-in-ar chitecture grant. The General Services Admin istration bought the 73-ton, rusted steel sculp ture for $175,000. The government has since decided to search for a more appreciative site for it. Richard Serra, the sculptor, in tum filed suit, claiming that relocation of his work would vio late his free speech right. Also involved in the suit were breach-of-contract, copyright, and trademark counts.

In August 1987, Senior U.S. District Judge Milton Pollack ruled that relocating "Tilted Arc" doesn't violate Serra's right to free speech, since the GSA owns the artwork. The other three counts were also dismissed, because of the government's sovereign immunity from these claims. Chicago bought a huge, red-brown metal work that looks like a woman from one angle and a horse from another. Nobody doubts that the artist had a reputation, but so did P. T. Barnum. In Tacoma, Washington, one per cent of the Eugenie Dickerson is a freelance writer who resides in Bellevue, Washington. cost of new public buildings and remodeling projects was set aside to be spent on public art. As decoration for their new stadium, Tacomans wound up with a string of neon lights in lop sided letters and squiggles for $272,000. Tacomans raged. They· forced the issue onto the ballot and voted 3 to 1 a recommendation that the work be removed. In a reverse type of censorship, the officials claimed the public needed a visual challenge and the thing would stay no matter what the tastes of the public.

But the people really hated the lights. An other drive was undertaken, this one to with draw the one per cent of capital improvement funds earmarked for the arts. This vote was binding and successful. The neon lights remain today, but the bu reaucrats haven't money to buy more kitsch. The Tacoma City Council allows Tacoma Dome renters the option of turning off the neon sculpture. Most do. Elsewhere in Washington, the art picture is more embarrassed than angry. The Legislative Building in the capital, Olympia, sports a mural known as "The Twelve Labors of Her cules." Raised in 1981, the work has been cov ered over since 1982 when state represent~tives declared it obscene. In April 1987, the legisla ture voted to remove the work. But this isn't a painting that can be pulled off a hook and rehung in the back room. This is artwork painted directly onto the wall of the House Chambers. Options are few: "Her cules" may be painted over, peeled off (with major damage to the artwork), or the state may disassemble the wall for relocation. Hobson's choice.

The artist, Michael Spafford, had another PUBLIC FUNDING FOR THE ARTS 147 An exhibit by local arts groups in the Tacoma Dome. idea. In May 1987, he filed suit to keep the mural in place, regardless of the fact that he had been paid for the work and regardless of public opinion. Yet "The Twelve Labors of Hercules" had been selected and approved by a peer panel process ahead of painting. Not surprisingly, the art community sympathizes with Spafford. There's nothing wrong with the principle of public funding for the arts, believes artist and dealer Laura Velaz of Redmond, Washington, as long as the right persons choose artwork ap propriate for the intended site. This was man aged nicely in fifteenth-and sixteenth-century Europe. "But," she says, "the Medicis had taste. " "Hercules" is the sort of disaster that can't be left up, can't be taken down, and can't be photographed and published in full in the news papers.

My personal.education on public funding for the arts began when my community received county money for a writers' club. I was asked to sit on the board because I had sold a few magazine articles. Indeed, all of us on the board claimed some personal interest in writing. One said she had done the actual writing for a best-selling book printed with only her husband's byline. Another wrote a play, unpublished. A third did unpaid editing for her church newsletter. One more was married to a doctor who contributed generously to the arts. Yet the area arts newsletter (a publicly funded freebie) billed the group as "a special ized panel of experts in Literary Arts." Pur chases of artworks and arts services nationwide are made by the peer review jury system. But for us, gathering artistic peers was more easily said than done. How did the writers' board dole out the county "one per cent for the arts" funds, to gether with club dues? Right away came the post office box. Never mind that for its first four months the box received not one piece of mail. The measure was necessary because "a first-class organization needs its own address,"

board members said. Most of the money was spent on newsletters, postage, coffee, and meeting room rents. But when asked by taxpayers where the money went, the first answer was invariably "to pay speakers who are professional writers." In truth, less than a third went to direct encourage ment of working writers. And which writers did the club get for speakers? There were two main types: the ex writer who began teaching when the muse de148 THE FREEMAN. APRIL 1988 parted, and the Californian who gave readings from his book on how to found a commune. Successful writers such as Ernest K. Gann turned us down. "Authors should be read and not seen or heard," he said. And he was right. Writers develop by writing and reading, not by listening to someone else's experiences. The very premise for this public expense is wrong. In these days of budget deficits, does the public really want to fund dilettantism?