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Hallelujah

From the Washington Post:

Dana Gioia, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts since March 2003, plans to announce today that in January he will leave the federal agency he is credited with helping revitalize.

Yeah, he revitalized it by turning it into the most cowering, deferential source of government arts funding this side of Syria.

Which was, arguably, his job. Once Bush got elected, everybody in the arts world knew—or should’ve known—that the NEA was in serious fucking trouble. An evangelical businessman (whose favorite philosopher is Jesus) needs to do some cutting to make good on his small-government campaign promises? The NEA had to put on its body armor.

Or cower in a corner. Which is precisely what it did, with an adult literacy program, some eduction stuff (particularly jazz), lots of “Shakespeare in the heartland programs.”

Those are all virtuous activities, but not the NEA’s jobs—the first two should be coming from education budgets and if there is a single goddamned playwright in the whole goddamned world who doesn’t need the NEA’s help, it’s Shakespeare.

The NEA doesn’t have to hang Tim Miller from his testicles with a rope made of $20 bills to prove its art-street cred, but it should at least spend American arts money promoting American playwrights: would it kill us to see a little more Tennessee Williams or August Wilson?

Anyway.

Gioia—and his immediate predecessors—deferred to social conservatives, put a muzzle on the NEA, and saw its budget rise a little bit to $144.7 million. (Up from $99 million in 1996.) Which is, perhaps, what he had to do to save his ass and his agency. But we won’t be sorry to see him go, along with the era he represents.

I sat in on a group interview with Gioia in Los Angeles last February. Somebody asked if he would resign at the end of Bush’s second term. He gave a non-answer that seemed like a yes.

He, at least, is a man of his non-word.

Comments (5)

1

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/13/uselections2008.usa

Great Gurdian story to ease your pain

Posted by Daniel Allen | September 12, 2008 5:06 PM
2

if I ever ge ridiculously wealthy ill fund some motherfucking arts. particularly musical theatre.

Posted by Bellevue Ave | September 12, 2008 5:18 PM
3

Amen, brother.

Posted by Wendy R. | September 13, 2008 11:07 AM
4

Was he worse than Lynn Cheney?

Posted by eliza | September 13, 2008 3:21 PM
5

I think the article is unfair to Gioia. He did an outstanding job given the political culture he had to work with. Due to clever misrepresentation by right-wing know-nothings, the NEA had been branded in the mind of most of the public as a far-left entity which gave tons of money to untalented America-haters. Grossly inaccurate, but that was the perception. Gioia has "rebranded" the NEA as more mainstream. I hope it can be more adventurous in an Obama administration with a large Democratic majority in Congress; nevertheless I suggest that funding for truly cutting-edge, politically tinged work will mainly have to come from foundations and individual donors. In my charitable giving, I make it a point to support theatres & art centers which present challenging work which is unlikely to attract sustained government or corporate funding - please consider doing likewise.

I look forward to seeing Gioia's poetry again.

Posted by BPJ | September 16, 2008 9:56 AM

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