Advocacy
Issues at a Glance
Advocacy Resources
Practical advice and resources regarding CAA Advocacy-related topics.Click here for CAA involvement.
Conservation, Public Spaces, and World Heritage
CAA monitors and takes action on national legislation and international issues affecting public spaces and cultural heritage, including: monuments, parks, plazas, civic squares, waterfronts, streets, public buildings, and architecture.Click here for CAA involvement.
Digital Initiatives
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Freedom of Expression and Censorship
CAA monitors and takes action on issues impacting freedom of expression in the visual arts and academia. CAA supports artists’ and scholars’ rights to free expression and opposes limits on intellectual inquiry, including censorship.Click here for CAA involvement.
Government Funding for the Arts and Humanities
CAA monitors and advocates for federal funding for the arts and humanities in a variety of areas, including: research, education, preservation and access, exhibitions, and public programs. The lead federal agencies in this area are the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), and the Office of Museum Services (OMS) within the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).The NEA broadens public access to the arts for all Americans. Each year, the NEA awards more than one thousand grants to nonprofit arts organizations for projects that bring the arts to millions.
The NEH is the largest single funder of humanities programs in the United States, enriching American intellectual and cultural life through support to museums, archives, libraries, colleges, universities, state humanities councils, public television and radio, and to individual scholars.
The OMS aims to increase and improve the services of America’s 8,000 museums attracting over 865 million visitors annually, with support to museums of all kinds: art, history, science, children’s specialized collections, and living collections such as zoos and aquariums.
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Government Leadership
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Higher Education
CAA monitors and takes action on government regulations affecting higher education, including the promotion and use of technologies such as communications to facilitate distance learning.CAA further encourages and supports those groups and activities, inside and outside of this Association, that set themselves the task of elevating the standards of teaching and curricula, of improving the materials of teaching, and of generally advancing the cause of learning in the arts at the secondary, undergraduate, and graduate levels.
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Intellectual-Property Rights
CAA monitors and takes action on proposed changes to intellectual-property law, including copyright law. While the fields of art and art history are comprised of both users and creators of intellectual property, CAA supports scholarly access to information and legal implementation of the fair-use doctrine in all media.CAA further encourages curators, librarians, collectors, dealers, public officials, and all others entrusted with the custody of works of art or documents associated with works of art to make these available for study to scholars, artists, and students.
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Museums and Galleries
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Philanthropy for the Arts and Humanities
CAA monitors and takes action on government regulations affecting foundations as well as the relationships between for-profit and nonprofit ventures in the arts. CAA further advocates for state and local support for the arts and humanities.Click here for CAA involvement.
Tax Policy
CAA monitors and takes action on tax reform policies that seek to preserve both exemption and philanthropic incentives, including tax deductions for charitable gifts, for individuals, nonprofit arts organizations, colleges and universities, and corporations.Click here for CAA involvement.
Visa Issues
CAA monitors and takes actions as are appropriate, including other learned societies and organizations to identify cases where scholars and artists are denied or are subject to unreasonable delays in granting US visas; advocate for the right of scholars and artists to engage in international exchange; and communicate the Association’s concerns on these issues to the membership, affected persons, and the public.Click here for CAA involvement.
Workplace Issues
CAA monitors and advocates for improved working conditions for its members, including: studio health and safety, tenure and promotion guidelines, guest-curator contract guidelines, part-time employment guidelines, and professional practices for visual-resources professionals.CAA further encourages the highest standards of creativity, scholarship, connoisseurship, and teaching in the areas of studio art, the history and criticism of the visual arts and architecture, and exhibitions; and to further these objectives in institutions of higher learning and of public service such as colleges, universities, art schools, museums, and other art organizations.
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Other Issues
As established in our advocacy policy, CAA may, from time to time, supplement or modify the issues set forth above to meet broadly supported interests or needs of its members. Any such changes require the approval of the Executive Committee or the Board of Directors.Click here for CAA involvement.