I know what I like

The National Endowment For The Arts: Virtual Censorship?

The National Endowment For The Arts is a government agency that helps to support artistic programs in America. Artists need something to live on while they’re producing their art, don’t they? And sometimes it takes quite a bit of time and effort to produce a piece of art that can be shared with the public, a piece of art that might turn a profit for an artist and his or her program.

But The National Endowment For The Arts, using taxpayers money, can only support a limited number of artistic programs. There is only so much money to go around. The decisions The National Endowment For The Arts makes in issuing its grants helps determine what art is produced in this country and what art may never see the light of day.

How does The National Endowment For The Arts choose which artists to support? Do the decisions made by The National Endowment For The Arts work as a kind of “filter” for art in America? Is The National Endowment For The Arts a kind of government censor for art in America?

Go to The National Endowment For The Arts’ website at http://arts.endow.gov/grants/index.html and find out how The National Endowment For The Arts decides who gets grants to complete work and who is denied. Find out who has been given grants in recent years and what kind of art these artists have created.

Write a short journal – no more than a page in length – giving your opinion of The National Endowment For The Arts and how it decides what art is America receives the benefit of government sponsorship.

Images above, from left to right: dancer and choreographer Suzanne Ferrell; film director Ron Howard; blues guitarist Buddy Guy; dancer and choreographer Tommy Tune; conductor Leonard Slatkin