Landesman’s Congressional Testimony: "American Masterpieces" Axed for "Our Town"

Rocco Landesman, NEA's chairman, speaking in Boise, Idaho
Photo: NEA staff

Want to make a charitable donation to the federal government? You can! Long a part of the National Endowment for the Arts' website, the Donate page solicits various forms of personal and corporate largesse to this federal agency---from one-shot benefactions to annual giving to post-mortem support:

You may want to include a bequest in your will or a deferred gift in your estate planning. And, if you like, you can specify how your gift will be used, in a particular discipline or a national initiative that is especially meaningful to you.

What, you thought your tax dollars constituted your contribution to the NEA? Well yes, but the President's proposed fiscal 2011 appropriation for the agency is only $161.315 million---the same amount he proposed for fiscal 2010, but less than the $167.5 million that Congress ultimately allocated for fiscal 2010.

That doesn't leave much room for creativity by the agency's Obama-appointed chairman, Rocco Landesman, who wants to launch a new (and to my mind, misconceived) "Our Town" initiative (apologies to Thornton Wilder), which would provide "$5 million in up to 35 communities to support planning and design projects, and arts engagement strategies."

Since he wants to do more with less funding, the NEA plans to eliminate the $10-million American Masterpieces program, which supports "performances, exhibitions, tours, and educational programs across different art forms that reach large and small communities in all 50 states." (Click the link to see specific programs it has funded.) Landesman says the American Masterpieces projects were "largely redundant" with what's funded under the individual program disciplines (visual arts, theater, music etc.).

He announced all this today in his first formal address to members of Congress (specifically, the House Appropriation Subcommitee on Interior, Environment and Related Agencies). The NEA's 77-page Appropriations Request for 2011, about which he testified, is here.

The initiative that I like is Rocco's effort to promote coordination among federal agencies to meet arts-related needs. (This was supposed to be one of the mandates of Kalpen Modi, who recently decided to leave his position as the White Houses' associate director of public engagement to resume his former identity as actor Kal Penn, star of the "Harold and Kumar" movies.)

The part of Landesman's agenda that I don't like is telling artists and cultural institutions what they need government funds for, instead of the other way around. New initiatives and programs should grow out of the needs of the cultural community, not be imposed on them based on a bureaucratic notion of what towns and cities need in the way of cultural enhancement.

Here's the description of Our Town in Landesman's prepared Congressional testimony:

The funded projects might include the mapping of a cultural district along with its development potential; the integration of public art into civic spaces; a community waterfront festival; affordable housing for low-income artists; rehearsal spaces to serve as research and development space for our performing arts companies; outdoor exhibitions and performances to enliven civic spaces and engage citizens; and on and on.

The emphasis here appears to be more on urban development than on art. This may be a good way to appeal to politicians, but it's not the best way to serve culture. As I've previously stated, artists' housing is not an appropriate project for the under-financed NEA.

Unlike American Masterpieces, its counterpart in literature, The Big Read, "will continue as the agency's largest national initiative," Landesman told the Congressmen. But its proposed funding is $1.5 million, less than half the $3.72 million in grants for the current fiscal year. And at $5 million, Our Town would be much larger.

In previous conversation with me, Rocco had suggested he was eyeing The Big Read for possible elimination. It promotes community-based programs centering around your favorite high school classics. Congress effectively put an end to ending The Big Read, with specific language in the federal appropriations bill for the NEA that directed the agency to prepare a "detailed funding plan for the continuation of this popular and and successful program."

I'd like the NEA to go back to basics, finding out how best to support the creative and intellectual output of artists, arts organizations and cultural institutions, by taking its cues from them, the NEA's true constituents. The Department of Education would be a great source of funding for The Big Read. The Department of Housing and Urban Development should address the need for artists' housing. The NEA should stick closely to its core mandate---supporting the arts. The idea of the new chairman that I like best, which he has not yet dared to push for, is restoring grants to individual artists.

By the way, I'd hesitate, if I were you, about making a bequest to the NEA to support "a national initiative that is especially meaningful to you." Those initiatives, such as American Masterpieces, tend to come and go with each passing Administration.