Should the State fund the arts?

[Rum]

So we fund arts out of our taxes to explore the question 'why fucking bother'? Just asking...I support it btw!

[Warren Dew]

I don't have the figures to hand, and frankly I am not sure they even exist. There are a few major players like the Saatchi brothers, very high profile and associated with high profile 'artists' such as Tracy Emmin, but not as far as I am aware with overall day to day funding. We have traditionally relied on the state, as has most of Europe.

I guess the old European tradition was for artists to work for monarchs and the nobility, so when the latter were replaced by more modern states, their roles in art were too.

[Eriku]

Yes, especially arts education.

We can have a strong economy and military might, but you have to have something for it to all be for. There has to be an answer to the question of "Why fucking bother".

Fuck that... I'd rather that they lumped all the money aimed at figuring out "why bother?" at us poor unmotivated sods who can't sustain ourselves because we haven't been able to find an answer to that.

[Robert_S]

Yes, especially arts education.

We can have a strong economy and military might, but you have to have something for it to all be for. There has to be an answer to the question of "Why fucking bother".

Fuck that... I'd rather that they lumped all the money aimed at figuring out "why bother?" at us poor unmotivated sods who can't sustain ourselves because we haven't been able to find an answer to that.

Because you don't know the answer to "why bother?" yo want the government to not spend any money figuring out why we should bother?


I admit that that post could have more substantial, but I was hungry for General Tso's Bean Kurd.

IMO arts education improves the quality of life, at least in my experience. For example: every day since I learned a bit about architectural styles, I have paid more attention to the buildings around me and have gotten so much more enjoyment out of looking at them. It never made me a dime, but it has increased the level of happiness over the span of my life immensely.

When the arts go, is literature next? how about a generation without poetry? A generation without the ability to see the virtues of any music besides whatever median crap it is they're playing on the radio?

[Trolldor]

The 'arts' is more than that. As I said, it's about expression - satire, tragedy, parody and so on - I've never yet heard of a thriving civilisation that did not have a vibrant artistic culture.

[AnInconvenientScotsman]

We can have the arts without having to subsidise it, you realise. In fact, it's a lot of the actual artists who don't get subsidised. My cousin is a jeweller and her company has never been helped out by the government, very few are.

[leo-rcc]

I think art and music that is not popular should be subsidized to keep it alive for anyone to see. An opera is just not the same if you watch it on DVD or read the notes, a live performance really demonstrates the power of the composition and the skill of the performers. But in order to make it accessible to more than just the wealthier people, you need to fund these arts to keep ticket price down.

[Tero]

Symphonies and such areroutinely subsidized. Even rural folks, who live hundreds of miles from the nearest symphony, pay the tax.

But it does not bother me even if it waste. They also support arts that annoy the hell out of conservatives. Maplethorp exhibits, sacrilegious art etc.

[ED209]

We can have the arts without having to subsidise it, you realise. In fact, it's a lot of the actual artists who don't get subsidised. My cousin is a jeweller and her company has never been helped out by the government, very few are.

This. SWMBO plays in our provincial backwater town's 'symphony orchestra' which receives not a penny of govt funding and instead funds itself by practising in a cheap/maybe even free church (spit) hall and selling tickets to a performance once or twice a year. Similarly artists spring up everywhere not because of govt handouts but for the love of it and the hope that one day they'll gain recognition.

As someone who knows almost nothing about art I will nonetheless weigh in with the observation that govt grants only seem to go absolute bullshit, explicitly by virtue of the fact that noone is interested in actually paying to see it themselves. Not sure why that needs to be preserved at public expense TBH.

[mistermack]

I'm not happy with the principle of funding the arts, but I think we have to do it, because other countries do it.
We are in a competitive market for tourists, and we have to respond to what our competitors do. If we let our own institutions wither, fewer people will visit, and our own fans will go abroad and take money out of the country.

So even though I begrudge a single penny going to the arts, I still think we should do it.

The American taxpayers DO subsidise the arts heavily. Not directly through tax payments, but indirectly through tax breaks for charities and company sponsorships.
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