When Culture & Politics Collide: We’ve Been Here Before
The current crisis in federal funding affecting nonprofit cultural organizations is, regrettably, an old story with new narrators. Choosing how to respond in this moment, however, is up to us.
Over 35 years ago, I experienced first-hand a similar cultural backlash while working at Artists Space, a New York City-based champion of contemporary visual culture by emerging and mid-career artists without gallery representation. In late 1989, then Senators Jesse Helms (R-NC) and Alphonse D’Amato (R-NY) led an attack on what they considered “morally reprehensible” art, artists, and their presenting organizations. Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ and Robert Mapplethorpe’s cancelled photography retrospective at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, among many other targets of the politicians’ fury, will forever be remembered not for the artworks’ aesthetics and social commentary, but for the heated political controversy they roused.
At Artists Space, where I served early in my career as its first full-time director of development, a $10,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts had been awarded to the peer-reviewed catalogue for Witnesses Against Our Vanishing. This group exhibition, curated by photographer Nan Goldin and presented in fall 1989/winter 1990, poignantly chronicled how the AIDS epidemic had decimated the artists’ community of Lower Manhattan. The legislators were particularly incensed by David Wojnarowicz’s essay on cultural censorship and pressured John Frohnmayer, then newly appointed head of the NEA under President George H.W. Bush, to withdraw the grant.
Demonstrators protest the reactionary federal defunding of Witnesses Against Our Vanishing at Artists Space, 16 Nov 1989.
The community response to the defunding was swift and loud—organized protests led by ACT UP formed the soundtrack outside Artists Space’s front stoop as substitute money poured in tenfold from donors: the board, artists, collectors, and outraged citizens wanting to uphold First Amendment rights. Like today’s crisis (at least as of this writing), the one at Artists Space was resolved when funding was restored two weeks later. But unlike what we are seeing today with leading foundations stepping up to replace federal funds, the institutional community (foundations and corporations) soon visibly retreated. Artists Space was suddenly toxic. This was especially concerning because its fundraising program had relied heavily on foundation and government grants to underwrite the annual operating budget.
The controversy changed the complexion of the organization for a time, from being proactive and artist centric to reactive and unsure of itself. The NEA and powerful politicians had called its very purpose into question. Susan Wyatt, the executive director who helmed the organization during this challenging period, eventually succumbed to the pressure that came from second-guessing Artists Space’s intentions. Within a year, most of the senior team had left and the organization was forced to retrench, reconsider, and eventually regain its footing.
Crises are often catalyzing, though it’s best not to wait for one to test organizational mettle. What were the lessons that my colleagues and I learned from this experience? There are five that still have resonance today:
The importance of upholding your core principles and remaining committed to why you exist, what you stand for, and who you serve. Giving in to shifting political winds only weakens organizational resolve, which won’t win friends nor generate stability over the long term.
The merit of partnering with your peers. There is strength in numbers. Artists Space greatly benefited from the advocacy of ACT UP and other activist organizations, whose members showed up in droves to stand in solidarity with artists.
The benefit of hiring skilled crisis communications counsel to bring expertise and objectivity to the situation, helping you to stay on message and screen out the extraneous.
The criticality of elevating your annual fund program by focusing on individuals. For small and mid-size organizations like Artists Space that have depended on institutional support, this means shifting emphasis to people who join as members or subscribers, attend programs and events, and find value in your offerings. This also means getting to know your community through lots of face-to-face interactions and personalized communications, which is a longer-term, more labor-intensive, and authentic kind of relationship building.
The value of investing in your professional staff, convening them regularly, talking with them honestly and transparently, seeking their feedback, and empowering them to join leadership in direction setting and decision-making.
Here’s hoping (and actively working to make it so) that we learn from history, bond together as a nation that respects free expression and civil liberties, and emerge from today’s defining moments the stronger for it.
Image credit: Courtesy of Artists Space, 1989.