Advocacy

American audiences for the arts are getting older and their numbers are declining, according to new research released yesterday by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). Arts Participation 2008: Highlights from a National Survey, which can be ordered or downloaded from the NEA website, features top findings from the 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, the nation’s largest and most representative periodic study of adult participation in arts events and activities, conducted by the NEA in partnership with the US Census Bureau.

Five times since 1982, the survey has asked US adults eighteen and older about their patterns of arts participation over a twelve-month period. The 2008 survey reveals dwindling audiences for many art forms, but it also captures new data on internet use and other forms of arts participation. Although the 2008 recession likely affected survey responses, long-term trend analysis indicates that other factors also may have contributed to lower arts participation rates.

There are persistent patterns of decline in participation for most art forms. Although nearly 35 percent of US adults—an estimated 78 million—attended an art museum or an arts performance in the 2008 survey period, the figure is a decline from 40 percent reported in 1982, 1992, and 2002.

Attendance at the most popular types of arts events—such as art museums and craft or visual-arts festivals—saw notable declines. The US rate of attendance for art museums fell slightly from a high of 26 percent in 1992–2002 to 23 percent in 2008, comparable to the 1982 level.

Further, fewer adults are creating and performing art. Weaving and sewing remain popular as crafts, but the percentage of adults who do those activities has declined by 12 points. Only the number of adults doing photography has increased—from 12 percent in 1992 to 15 percent in 2008.

Historically the most dependable arts participants, forty-five to fifty-four-year-olds, showed the steepest declines in attendance for most art events, compared with other age groups. Educated Americans—the most likely to attend or participate in the arts—are doing so less than before, and less-educated adults have significantly reduced their already low levels of attendance.

In a positive trend, the internet and mass media are reaching substantial audiences for the arts. Consider these findings:

• About 70 percent of US adults went online for any purpose in 2008 survey, and of those adults, nearly 40 percent used the web to view, listen to, download, or post artworks or performances
• Thirty percent of internet-using adults download, watch, or listen to music, theater, or dance performances online at least once a week. More than 20 percent of them view paintings, sculpture, or photography at least once a week
• More Americans view or listen to broadcasts and recordings of arts events than attend them live (live theater being the sole exception). Classical and Latin or salsa music were the most popular music categories (with 40 and 33.5 million viewers/listeners, respectively), and 33.7 million adults reported listening to, or viewing programs or recordings about books and writers. The same number (33.7 million) enjoyed broadcasts or recordings about the visual arts.

The entire survey questionnaire, the raw data, and a user’s guide are available both on the NEA website and from Princeton University’s Cultural Policy and the Arts National Data Archive (CPANDA). More detailed study results will be available later this year.

Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate former Republican Congressman Jim Leach as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Obama said, “I am confident that with Jim as its head, the National Endowment for the Humanities will continue on its vital mission of supporting the humanities and giving the American public access to the rich resources of our culture. Jim is a valued and dedicated public servant and I look forward to working with him in the months and years ahead.”

Jim Leach served as a member of the US House of Representatives for the state of Iowa for thirty years. He founded and cochaired the Congressional Humanities Caucus, which is dedicated to  advocating on behalf of the humanities in the House and to raising the profile of humanities in the United States. The caucus worked to promote and preserve humanities programs and commissions such as the Historical Publications and Records Commission. Leach and his cofounder, Rep. David Price, received the Sidney R. Yates Award for Distinguished Public Service to the Humanities from the National Humanities Alliance in 2005. During his tenure in Congress, Leach also served as chairman of the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services (1995-2001), a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations, and chairman of the committee’s Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs (2001-6). In addition, Leach is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the vice chairman of the Century Foundation’s board of trustees and has served on the boards of the Social Sciences Research Council, ProPublica, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Kettering Foundation. Since leaving Congress in 2007, he has taught at Princeton University and served as the interim director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

“Serious long-term challenges posed by rapid globalization, economic crisis, and threats to our national security require solutions informed by the humanities,” wrote Pauline Yu, president of the American Council of Learned Societies, in a testimony submitted last month to the House of Representations in support of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Yu called for at least $230 million in funding for the NEH for fiscal year 2010—an increase of $75 million above the present year’s budget. (Download and read Yu’s full testimony to the Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies.)

Earlier this month, however, President Barack Obama’s FY 2010 budget allotted only $171.315 million for the endowment, far short of Yu’s request but $16.315 million more than the current year.

With this proposed increase, the NEH seeks to establish a new grant program, entitled Sustaining Cultural Heritage Collections, which will allow institutions to plan or implement preventative conservation measures that prolong the useful life of humanities collections. The endowment will also reintroduce preservation research and development grants for projects that address major challenges in preserving and maintaining access to humanities collections and resources. And through its We the People program, the NEH will continue to fund humanities projects that strengthen the teaching, study, and understanding of the nation’s history and culture.

Additionally, Obama’s request includes new oversight responsibility for the National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs program. With the program’s transfer from the US Commission of Fine Arts, the NEH will manage a redesigned program of competitive grants to arts, historical, and cultural institutions in the District of Columbia.

In addition to a general overview of Obama’s NEH budget request, more information is available in the summary and highlights or the detailed budget request of the endowment’s FY 2010 appropriation request. A table with the FY 2010 funding request figures, by division and office with FY 2008 and FY 2009 appropriation amounts, is also available.

See also a brief report on funding for the National Endowment for the Art for FY 2010.

Andrea Kirsh, an independent art historian based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and a member of the CAA Board of Directors, was one of several CAA delegates who attended Humanities Advocacy Day and Arts Advocacy Day, both of which took place in March 2009 in Washington, DC.

In an article for the forthcoming May issue of CAA News that is also posted online, she writes about her experiences advocating for increased funding for the National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities, among other government programs and legislation.

Photo: The Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Josh Groban (center) advocates for the arts with CAA board member Judith Thorpe (left) and Jean Miller at the Congressional Breakfast during Arts Advocacy Day

The board of overseers at the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University released a statement yesterday, found here and here, to counter provost Marty Wyngaarden Krauss’s missive from last week about keeping the building open to art exhibitions beyond this summer. Since late January, when the university first announced plans to close the museum and sell its collections, the school administration has backpedaled several times, claiming to transform the museum into an art study and exhibition center (which it already is), to not sell the entire collection, and to continue hosting exhibitions. To which the board responds:

In her letter, Krauss attempted to clarify future plans for the Rose Art Museum once the University closes it on June 30, 2009. Despite the existence of the current Board of Overseers for the museum, Brandeis has named a new committee to “explore future options for the Rose.” In addition, the current position of museum director will be eliminated. According to Jon Lee, chair of the Rose Art Museum’s Board of Overseers, “Without a director or curator, the Rose cannot continue to function as a museum under any meaningful definition. Since the University’s announcement on January 26, 2009 that it would close the museum, membership and Rose Overseer dues, and all donations have ceased or been asked to be returned. This amounts to more than $2.5 million.”

“When the Rose family originally founded the Rose Art Museum, they were very clear about its mission and the integral role it would play as a part of the Brandeis community,” said Meryl Rose, a member of the Rose Art Museum’s Board of Overseers and a relative to the original museum founders. “A museum with a collection and reputation such as the Rose needs a director, and while Krauss’s letter states that the collection will be cared for, it does not erase the fact that the Rose as we know it will cease to exist under the administration’s current plans. The administration is carrying out an elaborate charade, the first step of which is to turn the Rose from a true museum as its founders intended, into something quite different….”

Again, the full statement can be found here and here. Richard Lacayo, art and architectural critic for Time, wrote about Brandeis’s announcement last week and quotes Rose director Michael Rush:

So long as the Rose remains open as a museum, it remains subject to the ethical guidelines of American museum groups that do what they can to discourage the kind of emergency sales that Brandeis is contemplating. But I spoke later with Michael Rush, the director of the Rose, who will soon be gone, along with several other significant Rose staffers. He was skeptical about what the university was doing. “They’re talking about keeping the Rose open,” he said. “But there’s no director, no curator, no education director, no funding stream and no program.”

An update to Lacayo’s report is a message from Jon Lee, Rose board chairman, which notes that Massachusett’s Attorney General office is watching developments closely. Relatedly, Art in America has published an interview with Meryl Rose, in which potential legal action is briefly discussed.

The situation at Brandeis is one of many taking place concerning unusual uses of restricted endowments and related funding. In his article “New Unrest on Campus as Donors Rebel,” John Hechinger of the Wall Street Journal writes, “As schools struggle more than they have in decades to fund their core operations, many are looking to a rich pool of so-called restricted gifts—held in endowments whose donors often provide firm instructions on how their money should be spent.”

Read more of CAA’s coverage of the Rose Art Museum. The museum itself has been keeping a comprehensive log of articles and reviews.

The Artist-Museum Partnership Act of 2009, legislation introduced in both houses of Congress, would allow a fair-market-value tax deduction for charitable contributions of literary, musical, artistic, or scholarly compositions to collecting institutions such as museums, libraries, and archives. At present, a donating artist, writer, or composer can only deduct the cost of materials used to create the work, which is not a fair incentive to donate and also hurts the missions of public and nonprofit institutions nationwide to increase public access to these unique creations.

The sponsors of the bill—Senators Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Robert Bennett (R-UT) for S 405 and Representatives John Lewis (D-GA) and Todd Platts (R-PA) for HR 1126—hope that past enthusiasm for such legislation will grow in the current 111th Congress. Although similar Senate bills have passed five times in previous years, the House version of the bill in the 110th Congress had 111 cosponsors. Now that a new Congress is underway, more cosponsors are needed to help advance the bill.

The American Association of Museums has worked with the Association of Art Museum Directors to provide a draft letter that you can use to encourage your federal lawmakers to cosponsor the bill. With your help, this important legislation for both artists and institutions can move forward.

The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded $19.8 million in one-time grants under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. National service organizations, state arts agencies, and regional arts organizations—from the Southern Arts Federation to the Arizona Commission on the Arts—have individually received amounts from $25,000 to nearly $600,000 to support the arts sector of the economy; most groups have received awards in the low six figures. The NEA has published the complete list of grants and amounts.

The NEA’s state and regional partners will invest their recovery funds in projects that assist arts organizations in retaining critical staff as well as artists and other contractual personnel. These critical staff will enhance the ability of arts organizations to realize their artistic and public service goals. State and regional agencies will mirror the NEA’s recovery grant program and adapt their programs to respond to the particular needs of their constituents.

In July, the endowment will announce a second category of one-time direct recovery grants, which will support a nonprofit arts sector that has seen declines in philanthropic and other support during the current economic downturn. Please see the NEA’s recovery page for updates on these recovery grants, agency reports, and other information.

On Tuesday, March 23, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit will reconsider the case of a Swiss professor and Muslim scholar, Tariq Ramadan, who was banned from entering the country in 2004, reports John Schwartz of theNew York Times. Based on a provision for ideological exclusion in the USA Patriot Act, Ramadan was declined a visa by the US government to travel to America and take a position at the University of Notre Dame.

The American Academy of Religion, the American Association of University Professors, and PEN American Center all support the American Civil Liberties Union, which is challenging a 2007 ruling that upheld the government’s decision. Arguing for Americans’ First Amendment rights to hear Ramadan, this coalition is also calling on the new presidential administration to end ideological exclusion.

The Patriot Act allows the US to deny a visa to anyone whom it believes has endorsed or espoused terrorist activity or persuaded others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity. The ACLU, however, claims the government used the provision more broadly to deny entry to scholars, writers, and activists whose political views it disfavored. After the ACLU initially filed suit, Schwartz reports, the government asserted that Ramadan made contributions from 1998 to 2002 to a charity in Switzerland, called the Association de Secours Palestinien, which theTreasury Department had deemed a Hamas-affiliated terrorist organization.

A bill drafted by Richard L. Brodsky, an assemblyman in the New York State Legislature, aims to prevent museums from paying for general operating expenses with the sales of artworks. Brodsky collaborated with the New York State Board of Regents and the Museum Association of New York in response, in part, to a recent deaccession by the National Academy Museum and the planned sale of works from the upstate historic site Fort Ticonderoga, as well as the decision by Brandeis University to close the Rose Art Museum in Massachusetts.

Robin Pogrebin of the New York Times reports that the board of regents already has regulations on the sale of art in place, but that these rules were too general. The proposed bill would echo standards by the American Association of Museums and Association of Art Museum Directors, which state that sales of works may be used only to acquire more works.

On March 11, 2009, President Barack Obama signed the FY 2009 Omnibus Appropriations Act, which was approved by the Senate that same day and by the House of Representatives nearly two weeks earlier. Funding most government operations through September 30, the act includes an additional $10 million for both the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, increasing their current fiscal-year budgets to $155 million each. The legislation also raises the budget for the Department of Education’s Arts in Education programs to $38.16 million, and for the Office of Museum Services through the Institute of Museum and Library Services to $35 million.

In a happy coincidence, the Omnibus Appropriations Act was passed by the Senate and signed into law on Humanities Advocacy Day, in which CAA participated. Robert L. Lynch, president and chief executive officer of Americans for the Arts, said “On the heels of its landmark support for nonprofit arts job recovery in the economic stimulus package, Congress has taken another step forward in restoring full funding to the nation’s cultural agencies. This marks the second consecutive increase in federal grant funds for local and state cultural organizations across the country. We are pleased that Congress is recognizing the cultural, educational, and economic contributions that an investment in the arts brings to communities and states throughout the nation.”

David Alexander has more on the larger picture in his article for the Washington Post.