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University Daily Kansan Wednesday, March 28. 1962
Performing Arts Subsidy Discussed
By Richard Bonett
(This is the final article of a three-
week economic crisis in the performing arts.)
What is the solution to the economic difficulties that some experts fear will bring about the collapse of the performing arts in the United States?
Anthony Bliss, president of the Metropolitan Opera association, sees the providing of expanded employment opportunities for the artists—musicians, singers, dancers, and actors—as part of the central problem.
Few in favor of a performing arts subsidy propose that the federal government take over the entire responsibility for operating the hundreds of artistic institutions spread across the nation, or even a selected group of the more famous ones.
VARIOUS PROPOSALS HAVE been put forth to accomplish this goal, including longer seasons, more and expanded tours, special performances and possibly more live appearances on television. All but the last of these suggestions, however, appear to depend heavily on some type of subsidy.
In testimony before the Select Subcommittee on Education of the House Education and Labor Committee in New York last November, Herman Kenin, president of the American Federation of Musicians and one of the most vocal backers of a federal subsidy, said:
A broad-scale subsidy for the performing arts—either on a federal, state or local level—is, in fact, the central issue of the debate over the financial difficulties of these arts.
"Subsidy for music and the performing arts—with a substantial assist from the box office—should operate at federal, state, and community levels.
"WE DO NOT CONTEMPLATE that government would or should foot the bill—only that it will pick up a share of the burden at the point at which it is becoming intolerable."
Similarly, Bliss warned that subsidy "should be approached very circumspectly. . . . Individual public support of musical organizations is indispensable."
Bliss, supported by others, suggests the formation of a national council for the arts, under federal auspices, as the first step in developing a comprehensive assistance program for the arts.
Various proposals for such an arts council have been made in Congress over the past four years, each time with the backing of the President. All were defeated.
ANOTHER MEASURE IS currently under consideration. Its author, Rep. Frank Thompson Jr., D-N.J., proposes a council under the Department of Health, Education and Welfare to "assist the growth and development of the arts in the United States." The council would be composed of 21 citizens representing all major fields of artistic endeavor.
In a recent magazine article, Thompson listed the objections to federal subsidy for the arts and commented that arguments against such assistance "must not be dismissed lightly."
While the Thompson measure is considered to be meek, past experience indicates strong Congressional opposition to any form of federal involvement in the arts.
He wrote, "There are those who fear . . . that government assistance will lead to government control. Others argue that whatever government sponsors in the arts would be mediocre in concept and performance."
Also feared, he said, is the development of "official" schools or cliques in the allocating machinery.
But, Thompson contends, the arguments add up to "kicking a straw man" since his bill proposes to set up only the machinery to
provide "leadership and tools for a broad look at American culture and artistic life in order to form some recommendations for its enrichment."
You Can Get PEPSI At SANDY'S
PROPONENTS OF DIRECT federal and state subsidy are more critical of the arguments against support for the performing arts. Kenin is outspoken on this point:
"Centuries of governmental benignice for the arts in foreign lands and more than a century of practiced subsidy in the United States for many, many endeavors other than the arts prove the hypocrisy of these timid critics (of subsidy)."
ASIDE FROM KEEPING THE more famous artistic institutions solvent, supporters of government aid programs argue, the effect of the subsidy in these countries also has been to keep down the price of an admission ticket.
A West German opera enthusiast may purchase a ticket for as little as 25 cents, while even local productions in this country are "pricing themselves out of existence."
Perhaps what has most angered proponents of an aid program for the arts in this country, in the face of arguments used by the critics, is evidence of direct and indirect subsidy to foreign culture as a result of U.S. foreign aid and cultural exchange programs.
During the Congressional subcommittee hearings in New York last November, Kenin made a special point of showing that while Turkey was receiving a half-billion dollars from the U.S., the Turkish government spent $3.3 million for an opera house in Istanbul. Similarly, he said, Austria restored the Vienna Opera House, after it was almost destroyed in World War II, while receiving Marshall Plan aid.
ROBERT SABIN, A MUSIC commentator, calls it a "tragic irony" that while American artistic institutions are struggling for economic survival, the U.S. government, since 1954, has sponsored foreign tours through the State Department exchange programs of more than 175 attractions, more than half of these musical.
A program such as Bliss suggests already is being tried in at least three states, New York, Kentucky and North Carolina. But these efforts are regarded only as a good start in the right direction.
Like Bliss, however, Goldberg believes the general public "must expect to provide a greater part of the cost of the performing arts. . ."
Bliss sees the financing of tours within the U.S. as the most effective means of subsidy allocations. Whereas he conceives of the tours as being state subsidized, Secretary of Labor Arthur Goldberg feels the federal government should participate on a matching-funds basis.
IN KENTUCKY. STATE SUBSIDY- referred to as the "government-in-culture-program" - sends the Louisville Symphony orchestra to state colleges and remote communities for eight pairs of concerts a year. The Arts Council of New York State subsidizes a tour of the Buffalo Philharmonic to the smaller communities.
"... the answer must not be found in what will amount to tyranny—be it of Red Square or Madison Avenue, for that matter, of Capitol Hill. There are alternatives, and creative minds should be able to find them."
America, the National Catholic Review, crystalizes the thinking of many in a recent article comparing Soviet cultural institutions with those in the U.S. and summarizing the question of government support for the arts:
(Continued from page 1) idea of sending food to the people of Communist China.
Kansans Urge—
Prof. Ise, in an interview with the Daily Kansan, said sending food to Communist China is "a matter of humanity with me. If your neighbor is starving you ought to feed him.
"IT'S THE PEOPLE of Communist China who are starving not the dictators."
Official Bulletin
Teacher Interviews:
March 30 — Dale T. Hobson, Public Schools, (Elem. & Sec.) El Centro, Calif.
 March 30 — G. C. Ekermann, Supervising Prin. Dist. 6, Littleton, Colorado
Catholic Daily Mass: 7 a.m. & 12:05 p.m. St. Lawrence Chapel, 1910 Stratford Road
Applications for editorship and business applications in office of the Chancellor be filled in office of the Chancellor by April 25. Any University student can apply. See Tom Yoe, 231 Strong, for details.
Confessions; Weekdays, 7 a.m. (during Mass) and 11:45-12 noon; Saturdays, 4-5 and 7-8 p.m. St. Lawrence Chapel, 1910 Stratford Road.
TODAY
People-to-People Forum: 4 p.m. For-
um Room, Kansas Union. Orientation
meeting for students planning to visit the
school. Jan Robert Ritsaume Van Eck in charge.
EL ATENEO se reune el micróleo dias 28 a las 4 de la tarde en la saia 11 Fraser. Walker y el Sr. Ben Morris, los dos recién llegados a Lawrence del II Año 1950 en la Cultura (en Costa Rica), Van a hablar sobre el Instituto de Educación Politica al que ellos asistieron durante si ano en San José, en la cultura hispana y en espanol, en la cultura hispana y en los programas de KU en el extranjeron estarEMENT invitados. Se servirán refrescos.
Mathematics Colloquium: 4:15 p.m. 109 Strong, Prof. Richard Anderson, Louisi-
omphism and Mapping Theories Home: Homemorphism and Mapping Theories Coffee: 3:50 p.m. 119 Strong Hall.
Young Democrats: 7 p.m., Jayhawk Room, Kansas Union.
SUA Bridge Lessons: 7 p.m. 306 Kansas Union. Instructor, Larry Bodle.
TOMORROW
Episcopal Holy Communion & Lunch:
12 noon. Curbarbury House.
KUOK: 2-News & Weather; 3:05-Top Forty Tunes; 4-Hilltopping; 6-News & Weather; 6:15-Sports; 6:20 Whittaker's Wax Works; 6:25-Spotlight on Science; 6:35-Bonjour Mesdames'; 6:45-Public Service Flight, Stage I; 6:55-Night Flight, Stage I; 10-News & Weather; 10:15-Night Flight, Stage II; 12-Portals of Prayer
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