[-empyre-] Art Funding and Politics

[NeMe]

In context to the other posts, it might just be that the present
ubiquitous funding cuts in culture echo Nabokov's lecture printed in
1981 (Russian Writers, Censors, and Readers, in "Lectures on Russian
Literature") where he stated that "Of the two forces that
simultaneously struggled for the possession of the artist's soul, of
the two critics who judged his work, the first was the government.
Throughout the last century the government remained aware that
anything outstanding and original in the way of creative thought was a
jarring note and a stride toward Revolution."

So, if Nabokov's statement was true for the historical period of the
Russian revolution and given the current climate should we not just
take the cuts by the governments as a repressive force towards
'creative thought' and therefore a reaction towards 'change'? Bill's
question "What kind of economy and, thus, what kind of art?" might be
a dangerous one for the arts as it links art production with economics
which can lead to the conclusion: when there is no money there will be
no art or at least there will just be 'cheap art'.

In my view, the equation of art and economics is not complete without
the political variable. It is policies (or lack of them) which affect
the economy. In a world where some corporations amass more assets than
some governments, the question of political decision making regarding
national economic sustainability and political power is a very complex
one with 'solutions' and 'statements' coming from all sides of the
political spectrum.

Rachel's post mentions that "'art' is being made out to feel the
effects of the political present last, when art is normally presumed
to grok it first" assumes that artists have (or should have) a
responsibility to foresee the future but as Virillio puts it history
has an "accidental character" (Virillio interview, Le Monde, 2008) and
as we all know accidents can not be foreseen.

Returning to the subject of politics, Virillio stated in the
aforementioned interview that "the state, is the guarantor of last
resort of collective life". Is it not the symbolic function of the
arts to reflect and comment on that 'collective life' and is it not
the State's responsibility to sustain it?


Yiannis Colakides
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