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PARTISAN REVIEW
Edward Rothstein:
My question is partly for Bob, about the possibility
of reforming the NEA, and it relates a bit to what Edith just said. Is it
possible to imagine, in a democratic culture, a governmental patron that
doesn't have to answer to democratic pressures-from interest groups,
political groups, ethnic organizations, advocates of particular styles, or
believers in various political functions artworks should serve. Because a
patron, in order to act as a patron should, must act out of taste. And in
this case we really don't have any way to conceive of any particular kind
of taste exercising itself in any effective way. So my question is, is it pos–
sible to imagine such a democratic government patron right now?
Robert Brustein:
Well, there are democratic countries where it is possi–
ble. Germany, France, England, and Italy all have agencies devoted to
dispersing public money not on a purely democratic basis, but on the
basis of excellence. As long as this Endowment is connected to the polit–
ical process, and the money has to be voted on by Congress, there is
going to be political interference and a demand for pork barreling. I
once proposed to make the Endowment into a genuine endowment.
In
other words, like the university, which has a bunch of money and lives
off the interest; it can dispense the proceeds without the approval of sen–
ators and congressmen. The way to get that money-although this ran
into a lot of criticism- was to change our law about seventy-five-year
copyright, that when the copyright is up the work of art becomes free
of any royalties. I proposed that we continue royalties for another ten
years and have them go to the National Endowment for the Arts. The
royalties of Hemingway or Faulkner or Fitzgerald or O'Neill would add
up to a hell of a lot. And before too long the National Endowment
would have money not in the millions, but in the billions, and it would
be genuinely free of government interference.
Hilton
Kramer: Well, one attempt
to
deal with the issue Ed Rothstein has
raised, which was relatively successful at the time, was when Nancy
Hanks ran the program. She knew her way around the political land–
scape. She made it a point, when there was a show at any museum, to
look up the birthplace of every living artist in those shows and write
to
the congressman in that district and say, Dear Congressman So and So,
Congratulations. Joe Blow from Missoula has just been given the honor
of showing at X Museum in New York or Washington or wherever.
Your committee granted money to this museum back in such and such
a time, and we want you to know how proud you should be of this
hometown boy making good in the big art world and so
Oll.
So when
