America’s identity has been squished, poked, and disfigured by forces of greed, power, and corruption. Thus, our image to the world is one of violence, faith over science and reason, and money over the rights of people and our environment.
What builds a nation? I remember when I was in High School and I read about the first McDonald's opening up in Russia in 1990. It was the first US chain there. We were bringing our culture abroad, and as a kid I was proud. Just recently, it made the news that the first Hooters was erected (pun intended) in Beijing, China. When I was younger, I was proud. Today, I am embarrassed. Countries take great pride in their culture and its image abroad, humble or great, and the best we can give is McDonald's and Hooters?
The myths of Adam & Eve tasting the fruit of knowledge, the people-powered Prometheus seeking fire from Mt. Olympus, and Daedalus crafting wings with his son Icarus to escape the Minotaur’s maze all have one thing in common. The belief that the status quo has never been good enough and that knowledge, creativity, and innovation are human pursuits worth supporting and fighting for. Dreams, ideas and how we transform them into reality are what make civilization possible.
Image is a powerful thing. What you see is what you believe, what you become. The right of our identity is in the hands of people who either don’t care about us, or mismanage us. For the past 7 years, President Bush has defined our Nation. Our problems need urgent solutions such as ending the war, tackling global warming, promoting science, and repairing our health care system. While the physical problems are obvious, it is also important to work towards the void of promoting creativity, ideas, innovation, and the arts in this country. As we know from trying to solve the problems of Iraq through military and physical means, repairing the wounds of a country is also a spiritual issue.
A nation’s pride comes through their contribution to culture, history, what they build and create, and the quality of daily life their citizens have and promote. I believe that Art is a powerful force for progressive causes. In addition to bringing aesthetic value to society, it can inspire intellectual, spiritual, and political change. This is why many totalitarian governments past and present work to censor art movements (think about O’Reilly’s mission against Daily Kos in regards to this site).
We in Daily Kos-land are well aware of dictators who are arrogant and close-minded. In addition to Hilter's persecution of the Jews, Catholics, Gypsies, and Invalids, Hitler's Nazi Party also persecuted freethinking and the arts. Hitler believed that an educated people was a dangerous thing and worked towards censoring ways of thinking that were different than his own.
"As for the degenerate artists, I forbid them to force their so-called experiences upon the public. If they do see fields blue, they are deranged, and should go to an asylum. If the only pretend to see them blue, they are criminals, and should go to prison. I will purge the nation of them." -- Adolf Hitler
"The artist does not create for the artist: He creates for the people and we will see to it that henceforth the people will be called in to judge its art". -- Adolf Hitler
One of the things that makes America great is, we are a land of many cultures, many beliefs, and thinking outside the box has improved our society. Compare what Hitler said about restricting thought to what FDR had to say on the arts' role in society...
"The arts that ennoble and refine life flourish only in the atmosphere of peace...for we know that only where men are free can the arts flourish and the civilization of national culture reach full flower.
The arts cannot thrive except where men are free to be themselves and to be in charge of the discipline of their own energies and ardors. The conditions for democracy and for art are one and the same. What we call liberty in politics results in freedom in the arts. There can be no vitality in the works gathered in a museum unless there exists the right of spontaneous life in the society in which the arts are nourished.
A world turned into a stereotype, a society converted into a regiment, a life translated into a routine, make it difficult for either art or artists to survive. Crush individuality in society and you crush art as well. Nourish the conditions of a free life and you nourish arts, too. In encouraging the creation and enjoyment of beautiful things we are furthering democracy itself." Roosevelt’s address on The Museum of Modern Art, as printed in the Herald Tribune on May 11, 1939. Roosevelt Speech on Art in Society
Repug Candidate Giuliani has a long history of distorting the facts, and intolerance to free speech that differs from his own beliefs. Rudy has this to say about art...
"An exhibition of paintings is not as communicative as speech, literature or live entertainment, and the artists' constitutional interest is thus minimal." -Giuliani appeal brief arguing against street artists having First Amendment protection, Giuliani v Lederman et al and Giuliani v Bery et al, filed with the U.S. Supreme Court 2/24/97.
"Elizabeth Freedman, an attorney speaking on behalf of the N.Y.C. Corporation Counsel's office [Mayor Giuliani’s 680 lawyers], explained the City's anti-art position. "Visual art...does not express ideas", Ms. Friedman said, "and as such is not entitled to First Amendment protection." 2/24/97 radio interview WNYC's syndicated business news show, "Marketplace" Giuliani's War on Individual Thought and Art
This sort of closed-minded mentality is as outdated as the Dark Ages and headed in a direction as bigoted and intolerant (though clearly not as violent) as the Nazi’s attitudes on art.
Art does express ideas, and does so in a powerful way. In works such as Guernica painted by Pablo Picasso in 1937, he depicts murder by the government highlighting its senselessness and cruelty. It depicts the town of Guernica in Spain being bombed by the Nazis after Franco gave Germany permission to tests its bombing weaponry. An estimated 250-1,600 were killed, and many more were injured. Picasso illuminates the price that is paid when governments no longer look after their people.
An important politically active art group known as the Guerilla Girls does artwork for progressive change. While corporations and the media work to create our structure of belief, identity, and history, these artists point out some scary problems with the message we are given.
The Guerrilla Girls are a group of feminist artists established in New York City in 1985, known for using guerrilla art to promote women and people of color in the arts.
One of their most famous posters was plastered across New York City buses in 1989. Its headline read, "Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum?" The Guerrilla Girls conducted a "weenie count" at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, counting naked males and naked females in the artworks as well as numbers of female artists in the collection. Less than 5% of the artists in the Met's modern art sections were women, but 85% of the nudes were female. Guerilla Girls and Progressive Art
Great things happen when citizens are given a chance to have intellectual, and aesthetic experiences. We need to not only tolerate and allow creative speech, research, and ideas, but also promote and fund them. It will enrich and inspire our lives, but also be a great model for the world as well.
Throughout history, art has been used as a tool to promote ideology. The pharaohs of Ancient Egypt built great monuments that promoted their beliefs and culture and their culture has survived to this day. America became the art capital of the world only when our government saw art as a symbol for a great society and began funding and promoting it abroad.
"Abstract expressionism was an American post-World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and also the one that put New York City at the center of the art world, a role formerly filled by Paris.
During the 1950s, the American Government used Abstract Expressionism as a political tool to highlight Artists who are allowed to make work under a government that promotes free-ideas. Much of Europe were still making art that was representational at the time and America began to be viewed as a leader of creative thought." Art Movements as a Symbol for a Nation's Successes
The visual world defines how we are, and how we think we are. Our culture is great, but flawed and we need the arts more than ever in times as troubled as these. Do we want to be a culture that hides ideas, truth, freedom, and creativity, or do we want to sell our identity to the war machines, the Waltons, the Giuliani’s and Bushes of this country?
The Arts provide cultural well-being to people. Imagine Italy without the Sistine Chapel or Egypt without the Pyramids of Giza or France without museums that house cultural history like the Louvre, the museum that protects and displays the Mona Lisa, by Leonardo da Vinci? The answer is, without art, the identity starts to disintegrate.
Our country is going through an Identity crisis. We need to promote things that make us great again. Science, Technology, Literature, Music, Theater, and of course, Art. Once Bush is gone, we need to remember that repairing the damage is not only a physical responsibility, but also a cultural and artistic responsibility as well. Only then can we be proud to be leaders of the world again. And remember, Art is people-powered. Without those to protect it and support it, Walmart will define the art for your future.
(disclosure: I am an artist)
(you might like this painting i did Painting of Bush