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Table of Contents National Campaign for Freedom of Expression Foreword Appendix I: What To Do If it Happens to You Appendix III: Sample Documents
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FOREWORD This handbook is the result of seven years of NCFE’s front-line experience helping artists and organizations that have faced threats to their freedom of artistic expression. The urge to censor is hardly new, and the means of censorship are varied. NCFE has worked to redress many cases of overt censorship—canceled performances, withdrawal of public funding, removal of books from library shelves—but censorship also occurs more covertly. Institutional censorship has had an impact on artists and cultural groups producing work considered at or outside the margins of “mainstream” society. Publishing houses, foundations, record companies, art galleries, movie studios, and museums, have historically been controlled by Caucasian men who haven’t always been welcoming to artists of color, women, or out gays and lesbians. NCFE has been an active participant in public policy discussions, educational forums, and the media, educating the public about and advocating for continued progress toward eliminating institutional censorship. At the end of the twentieth century, support for artists and cultures outside the mainstream has vastly improved. One precipitating factor of this change is also at the root of the threats to freedom of artistic expression today: public funding for culture. In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed legislation authorizing the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. Since then public funding for the arts and humanities has expanded, and today there are arts agencies in every state and territory, and in hundreds of county and municipal governments. There are also humanities commissions or councils in every state. Taxpayers have been serving as patrons of the arts and humanities for over thirty years. With this public support came the imperative to recognize the rich artistic diversity of the people, cultures, and communities that make up America. Nonprofit organizations and artists that had never been the beneficiaries of philanthropy received not only financial support but also the imprimatur of respected public agencies such as the National Endowment for the Arts. This respect was conferred by the peer panel process through which arts professionals adjudicate and award grants of public dollars to their peers. This process is a singular and powerful contribution to cultural democracy in America. There has been far more diversity in the NEA peer panels than in the Congress that has recently derided them. Peer panels—which change with each round of grant requests—have served to insulate the grantmaking process from political pressure by elected officials and even, to large extent, by the members of the granting commissions appointed by the president, governors, and mayors. Public funding of the arts and humanities has been a key factor in the diversification of American cultural life. This move to diversify support for arts programs was a political imperative for public agencies because the money is contributed by all taxpayers, who could expect (unlike in corporate or private philanthropy at the time) to be represented on the staffs, panels, and appointed commissions, as well as in the organizations that received public funding. Slowly but steadily, these agencies have nurtured cultural expression reflecting a far broader range of national experience than was generally portrayed before 1960. The rise of public arts funding took place concurrently with the rise of the civil rights, women’s, and gay and lesbian rights movements. As a result, we now can enjoy a rich gumbo of cultural and personal artistic expressions that did not exist before 1960. Ballet Hispanico (New York City), Northwest Asian American Theatre (Seattle), San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, Black Theatre Festival (North Carolina), California Indian Basketweavers Association, and Women Make Art (Austin) are a tiny sampling of the organizations that have received public funding from the NEA and local arts agencies. A list of individual artists who have received public support would yield a similar diversity. The culture of America has finally begun to “look like America.” Multiculturalism is neither rhetoric nor a political position; it is a reality as we move into the next millennium. Perhaps inevitably, there was a backlash from those who felt threatened by a multicultural America. Since 1989 the arts community has faced an escalating attack on freedom of artistic expression. In the spring of that year Robert Mapplethorpe (a gay photographer whose work included images of sadomasochism) and Andres Serrano (a photographer of Afro-Caribbean descent whose Piss Christ featured a plastic crucifix in a jar of urine) became the first targets in what has become known as the culture war. First denounced by the then little-known “religious right,” these “blasphemous” and transgressive images—some presentations of which were funded in small part by public tax dollars—presented a significant political opportunity for Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC) and his conservative cohorts. The established arts community did not exactly leap to the front lines to defend against these broadsides from the right. Some thought the controversy would “blow over” quickly, others felt that the Mapplethorpe and Serrano works were too difficult to defend, and still others did not wish to risk their own funding to champion art at the margins. The silence of mainstream cultural organizations was, in fact, as deafening as the cries of outrage from the other side. In the face of the controversy, the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C., canceled the Mapplethorpe exhibit because the gallery feared funding reprisal from Congress. That decision revealed an arts establishment vulnerable to attack. The fault lines were clear. In response to this leadership vacuum, the National Campaign for Freedom of Expression was created in 1990 by artists, arts activists, and administrators of the organizations who had supported, produced, and presented the works of artists under attack. Support also came from funders and colleagues in the civil liberties community who had a history of supporting cultural diversity and fighting censorship. One of the first actions of NCFE was to initiate a lawsuit against the NEA in 1990 on behalf of four artists (John Fleck, Karen Finley, Holly Hughes, and Tim Miller) whose grants had been denied by then–NEA chair John Frohnmayer from fear of a Congressional funding reprisal. Several months later the suit was amended to include a constitutional challenge to the “standards of decency” clause which Congress included in the reauthorization language of the NEA. Part of the suit was settled out of court in 1993 in favor of the four artists whose grants were reinstated. A federal district court ruled the “decency” language unconstitutional in 1992, and the Clinton administration appealed that decision. An appeals court upheld the district court ruling in November 1997. The administration appealed to the Supreme Court which heard the case in March 1998. A ruling is expected in June 1998. One unfortunate result of the court ruling against the “standards of decency,” was that the chair and members of the NEA’s National Council on the Arts learned to publicly talk about “artistic merit” when, in fact, their real concern was still the content. Although NEA spokespersons claimed otherwise, recorded transcripts of an August 1994 meeting of the council revealed that a decision to reject fellowships in photography for Andres Serrano, Barbara DeGenevieve, and Merry Alpern (fellowships that had been recommended by the peer panel) was motivated by concerns that there might be further political problems because of the content of the work. Council members also wanted to signal irate members of Congress that the NEA was paying attention to their outrage. A rise of less well publicized challenges to artistic freedom has occurred throughout the nation, many examples of which are included in this handbook. Artistic freedom is threatened by well-intentioned arts officials who have grown nervous about potential controversy. It is not uncommon for an exhibit director to ponder the selection of a particular work of art based on its potential for generating controversy rather than on its artistic merit. Arts organizations valiantly defend freedom of expression in the face of a controversial program, and afterwards artistic directors or curators are warned by board members or funders “to be careful” in the future. And many artists, fearing they will not get a grant or commission or will be excluded from a exhibition, submit work they think conforms to some vague notion of decency standards. The true chilling effect of censorship is self-censorship. Danilo Kis, the late Czech writer, wrote in HomoPoeticus (1985):
The war on the arts and culture is really a war on critical thinking, dissent, risk-taking, creativity, and democracy. With disinformation, sound bites, and defamation of character, conservatives have demonized artists, transforming them in the public mind into blasphemers and pornographers. Ironically, many of the artists who have been defunded and defamed for being immoral are in fact communicating a moral vision. It is just that their art, appropriately—though disparagingly—labeled “political,” is critical, unflinching, and often dissenting against the majority. Often all it takes for a piece of art to be censored is for one person to complain that he or she finds it offensive. It has become almost a criminal act to offend someone. Expressing criticism of a controversial work — often without even seeing it — is not enough for some people; because they are offended they don’t want anyone else to have access to the art. Perhaps they fear others will be offended. Perhaps they think others should be offended. But offending and dissenting are not only permissible but should be celebrated in a democratic society. The great Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa said, “Being an artist means never to avert one’s eyes.” I believe our challenge is not to avert our eyes from what artists see. And even if our religious or political beliefs compel us to avert our eyes we must, in a democracy, resist the urge to enforce our choice on others. As you review the material in this handbook, either as preparation for the possibility of facing a censorship challenge or because you are now in the midst of one, be clear about what you are risking and what you are fighting for. Speaking out or taking action against censorship can mean going against a prevailing or majority opinion; it can make an artist a pariah in his or her own community, even among other artists. If you are a bystander, this handbook will help you support the artist or organization in your community that stands up to threats of censorship. These battles are about the promise of liberty, equality, and democracy guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights for all Americans. These battles are about values: the value of respect for individual and cultural diversity in a nation of native peoples, immigrants, and descendants of immigrants. The value of intellectual freedom, critical thinking, and dissent in a world where fundamentalist militants and totalitarian regimes imprison and/or issue death threats against artists and journalists; and the value of artists and intellectuals in a free society. At the close of 1997, I end my tenure at NCFE with enormous respect for those individuals who have had the courage to stand up for freedom of expression, sometimes with little support, and even in the face of hostility in their own communities. We are all indebted to you. |
