{"id":1190,"date":"2025-06-03T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-03T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/scenechange\/?p=1190"},"modified":"2025-05-05T18:54:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-05T18:54:10","slug":"what-would-a-post-nea-arts-america-look-like","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/scenechange\/2025\/06\/03\/what-would-a-post-nea-arts-america-look-like\/","title":{"rendered":"SUMMER RERUN: What Would a Post-NEA (Arts) America Look Like?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

An all-too-prescient post from January 2025 begs you to answer the question: <\/strong>if<\/s> WHEN the NEA\u2019s funding is eliminated, how would that change what <\/strong>they<\/s> YOU do?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The National Endowment for the Arts building. For sale. Cheap.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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In early May 2025, Donald Trump issued an executive order calling for the elimination of the NEA, NEH, and several other arts, literature, and cultural agencies. Millions of dollars of grants have already been cancelled or, in some cases, rescinded after the money had been spent. For example, Portland Playhouse received an email from the endowment just 24 hours before opening a production of August Wilson\u2019s Joe Turner\u2019s Come and Gone<\/strong>. The N.E.A. had recommended a $25,000 grant for the show, which would have paid about one-fifth of the production\u2019s personnel costs. Emails from the current government officials stated, “The N.E.A. is updating its grantmaking policy priorities to focus funding on projects that reflect the nation\u2019s rich artistic heritage and creativity as prioritized by the president. Consequently, we are terminating awards that fall outside these new priorities.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a reprint of the January 2025 article that posed the question now on the lips of every arts organization leader in the United States.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In 2017, during the first year of the last Trump presidency, George Will wrote this in the Washington Post:<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Are NEA enthusiasts serene about government stipulating, as it must, art\u2019s public purposes that justify public funding? Or do they insist that public funds should be expended for no defined public purpose?\u2026 the NEA’s effects are regressive, funding programs that are\u2026 \u2018generally enjoyed by people of higher-income levels, making them a wealth transfer from poorer to wealthier.\u2019\u2026 Distilled to its essence, the argument for the NEA is: Art is a Good Thing, therefore a government subsidy for it is a Good Deed. To appreciate the non sequitur, substitute \u2018macaroni and cheese\u2019 for \u2018art.\u2019<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I no longer read the Post for Bezosius Hypocritus<\/em> reasons. And while I\u2019ve never been a big fan of George Will, whom I find to be even more of an elitist than those he excoriates in this article, he makes an interesting point. I would take (and have taken) his point a step further: even if \u201cmacaroni and cheese\u201d were considered a valid purpose for subsidy, does every producer of \u201cmacaroni and cheese\u201d deserve that subsidy? If that were the case, the government might as well subsidize Kraft (the equivalent would be government subsidy of Broadway because they often do better art).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh, wait. The government does subsidize Kraft.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Heritage Foundation<\/a> has listed its Lettermaniacal \u201cTen Good Reasons to Eliminate Funding for the National Endowment for the Arts. This is not a surprise, as the far-right think tank would also like to eliminate Medicare, the minimum wage, Social Security, unions, Head Start, Planned Parenthood, voting rights for “those people<\/em>,” and every other neglected American value for which liberals fought. The surprise, if there is one, is that the White House listens to the people who listen to the Heritage Foundation now. Simply, Rupert listens; and if Rupert\u2019s Rogues like it, the president likes it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reason #2 is interestingly provocative. \u201cThe NEA is Welfare for Cultural Elitists.\u201d On this, they\u2019re not completely wrong. Their research is not complete, but it doesn\u2019t take Columbo to see that the people being served by the arts (at least in the largest, most awarded organizations), as described by the audience (because little actual charity is going on), are mainly older, White, wealthy people. These same people even buy into that notion: donors donate so that donors may attend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cDespite heartwarming anecdotes, claims for the therapeutic use of the arts are not supported by empirical scientific evidence. Studies that claim to show the arts prevent crime are methodologically questionable, due to problems of self-selection.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

None of the other nine reasons are defensible. They\u2019re all structured on the opinion that limited government is preferable, which it is\u2026to them<\/em>. Limited government is always preferable to those who are harmed by simple human decency, such as the corporate kakistocracy that has burnt its torches and enabled this slow-motion coup d\u2019\u00e9tat.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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They went from Tea Party Patriots to Insurrectionists to today, running the chaos using the political party that gave us Abraham Lincoln (from \u201cFrankenstein\u201d (1931), dir. James Whale. Public Domain).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On November 2, 2023, the House voted down an amendment<\/a> (as part of House Resolution 4821) to eliminate funding for the NEA, 292-129, with 17 abstaining. All 205 members of the Democratic Party who were present (10 abstained) voted no in order to keep the funding, along with 87 republicans. 129 republicans voted to eliminate the funding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Here\u2019s the thing. We just had a new election. Of those 129 republicans who voted to eliminate funding, how many were re-elected, torches and all? You may have read in other media how the Democrats did. Nuff said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, what will the American arts scene look like if\/when NEA funding is eliminated?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

After all, that\u2019s why you clicked on this article. The quick answer, of course, is \u201cI don\u2019t know because I can\u2019t see the future.\u201d And, in fact, you\u2019re likely to have more answers than I on that. I look forward to reading them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will art just stop?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s hard to believe that art will cease to be created by artists. Artists, who have never received a great deal of financial support, have continued to create even though they average poverty level earnings through their art (about $25\/hour is the median, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics). It is also safest to say that those who create their own art (and would benefit from an NEA) earn far less than graphic designers and other artists who create corporate art for consumer consumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Will nonprofit arts organizations just go out of business?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The nonprofit arts organizations that continue this \u201cart for art\u2019s sake\u201d shenanigans will indeed go out of business \u2014 kicking, screaming, and begging for money. The ones who act like charities will succeed. It\u2019s really that simple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Internal Revenue Service has ruled that nonprofit arts organizations exist because they qualify. Existing and succeeding are two different things. Here\u2019s what the tax court decided in 1968 regarding the technical difference between commercial arts organizations and nonprofit arts organizations:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Court cited Broadway Theatre League of Lynchburg, Va. v. United States, 293 F. Supp. 346 (W.D. Va. 1968)\u2026.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The following characteristics were attributed to commercial theaters:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n