Everyone is familiar with art. Everyone has, at some point, taken classes in art in school. Art is all around us in one form or another. But does everyone really value art and what art represents? That's a difficult question to answer, but it seems like the answer might be "no" - and that this "no" is a very fundamental aspect of American culture.

In the Winter 2006 issue of the Wilson Quarterly, Camille Paglia writes:

The only answer to the competing tyrannies of religion and Hollywood is art. But art has never taken deep root in the United States; there is little sense that art represents the cultural heritage of the nation, as it does in Europe. The United States, which is still relatively young, began as a frontier society pragmatically focused on the future.

Art was a luxury and frivolity. Fundamentalist Protestantism also discouraged image making on biblical grounds. Even today, art remains a minority interest. It has been a struggle in recent decades to defend even modest federal arts funding, a situation worsened by a series of bitter controversies over contemporary artworks of antireligious or pornographic content.

Is art really a luxury or a frivolity? Is it better to spend money on things other than art — painting, sculpture, architecture, landscaping, poetry, film, etc.? This would be difficult to defend in an argument, but it’s precisely the general attitude and policy in America. Is there anything which can be done to shift attitudes around and get people to change?

 

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