chick little and the arts -- holding up the sky

We have an new governor, one with a tea party reputation. He did and said what was needed to get elected, and no one really has any idea what he’ll do in office. He’s expected to re-prioritize the budget, eliminate waste wherever it can be found and spend even less on state services. We all expect leaner times but one special interest group panicked, fearing annihilation it lit up social media, called for meetings to plan activism and retaliation, occupation of the rotunda, signs and shouting and stomping around. Gov said he had no idea how the rumor got started. What happened?

Methinks excessive protest reveals a special sensitivity, an uneasy conscience over privilege unearned -- how else to explain? They made it sound like the governor was about to kill art, an astounding idea. Predictions of doom which the average citizen may not have followed closely, or cared about, were dire. We should all be aroused considering what’s at stake -- what’s at stake? It probably isn’t art.

Art is old, here long before help arrived. It wasn’t contemporary art, of course, but an art admired and owned by the educated and well-traveled in many kentucky homes, and generally respected by everybody. Then the ‘state,’ federal, state, and local, got involved and suddenly there was a mission, the reeducation and cultural elevation of a heathen population. These agencies quickly became refuge to many a useless degree, to many who instead of making art decided to administer it. 

Here we have an exhibit featuring a wounded sawhorse, arrows in one flank, a hoof supported by a stack of vinyl records, in jackets, couldn’t tell what they were, not sure it’s important. A private gallery is not the place to see it. Takes tax money to sanction art of this calibre, and don’t it flow? Over on campus, check the non-profits, this is the art threatened when its state-funded budget is eliminated, along with phalanxes of copiers decommissioned and bleeping terminals gone blank. So sad.

Art would be dead, huh? With no more state money to support ‘conceptualists,' the cutting edge would round to general acceptance, and perhaps working artists could make a living on their own, directly, without dribbles of grant money and juried exhibits which alienate the public. Well, it didn’t happen. Everyone loses a nine percent slice, but the lights stay on, although I’m not sure all the commotion didn’t give the governor something to think about.