Getting involved with politics is always a dicey move. This is especially so considering the only reason for seeking out the state is personal benefit. Whatever advantage one derives from the political class stays in a period of authoritative limbo, forever subject to the individuals who brought it into existence. As the old saying goes, “a government big enough to give you everything you want, is a government big enough to take away everything that you have.” It’s a simple lesson that goes unheard all too often. The welfarists who moan about the need for greater subsidies never fail to reel back in horror when their preferred policies are cut. The same goes for the litany of industries who gorge at the trough of public finances. When the well dries up, the demands for “more” come out.
Common sense dictates that if you want autonomy, you don’t beg the most coercive institution in society for favors. That being said, artists have to be one of Canada’s most confused bunch of welfare recipients. Back in 2008, the Harper administration cut plans for a National Portrait Gallery in Ottawa. The art community was outraged. Painters took to their canvases to depict the Prime Minister as a tyrant who feasts on the remains of the destitute, after he pilfers their dead pockets for spare change of course.
The furor culminated into a fit of palette-stroked rage at a recent gallery in Ottawa. Among various depictions of Harper as a cross between imperial Napoleon and a military strongman, artist Margaret Sutherland displayed what she thought is a striking piece of political resistance art. Her portrait featured Harper in the buff being served a piping hot cup of Tim Horton’s coffee. The painting is supposed to depict Dear Leader as another Emperor who has no clothes, and is thus not immortal in the unwashed eyes of the masses. The Tim Horton’s cup of joe is, I suppose, a crack at Harper’s vocal affection for the chain.
When criticized by the Ottawa Citizen’s head art editor (The Big Beat) for overexposing everyone to a two-year-old portrait, Sutherland responded,
“Big Beat should see the ‘overexposed’ painting in person to get past the tittilation (sic) factor and better see the other metaphors involved, such as the headless lackeys behind the nude.”
I do not profess to have any profound understanding of what makes good art. Like Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart remarked on pornography, I simply know it when I see it. In many ways, art resembles fictional stories. It satisfies the human need for imaginary creation and aesthetic pleasure. Good art gives a sense of meaning and purpose behind the creator’s vision. It can either jump out at the viewer, or provide careful introspection. Most of all, it should stop wandering eyes and demand attention while being careful not to force it.
Sutherland’s au naturel satire of Stephen Harper is not good art. It makes for fine political mockery with a slight hint of cleverness. But it’s not something any prudent individual takes more than two minutes examining – especially so with an un-hidden phallus in plain view.
Political ridicule can be a great thing. But all the animus being thrown at the Harper by the art community is misguided. These are the same individuals who rely on government subsidization for their craft. By lashing out, they only bite the hand that feeds them. The rest of the not-so-sophisticated public is left shaking their heads at the hypocrisy.
Since 1957, the Canada Council for the Arts has been offering grants for artists who opt to jump through bureaucratic hurdles rather than devote time and energy to their line of work. Each year, the agency gives close to $200 million in grant dollars to applicants. This money doesn’t come strings-free. It is necessarily tainted with an expectation to create within the confines of “acceptable” statist doctrine. For example, the SummerWorks theatre festival in Toronto lost its $45,000 government grant in 2011. According to the Fraser Institute, the Prime Minister’s Office “expressed its disappointment that the festival had chosen to present a controversial play about a Canadian terrorist.” It isn’t conclusive that the grant was pulled precisely because of the contentious performance, but an educated inference can be made.
Any artist worth their salt would put focus into their skill instead of impressing bureaucrats with cash to toss around. A painter can’t eat off of what he is unable to sell. But that shouldn’t necessitate becoming an indentured servant to state planners holding the money bag. As Peter Jaworski puts it,
To make money as an artist in Canada, you have two choices: appeal to the crowd, or appeal for a grant. The former requires strong sales, good marketing, and a solid business plan. The latter requires an ability to fill in forms.
Of all the things government does, using taxpayer dollars to preserve culture is one of the less egregious on the list. Paying a bunch of bohemian leftists a barely livable wage to create products the market rejects is less coercive than locking up pot smokers or waging wars of mass murder. They may create trite and awful music, but at least they aren’t awarded medals for killing small children with remote-controlled drone bombs.
At the end of the day, the laws of economics can’t be overturned. You can pay musicians to play, artists to paint, and writers to author numerous works. But those activities are only marketable if the market says so – not the state. Government funding kills creativity. When there is no profit motive, there is little motive to be appealing. Value doesn’t always need to be represented through monetary cost, but it’s the most objective form of judging what others are willing to part with to be an exclusive owner. There’s a reason the works of Picasso, Monet, van Gogh, and Hopper never fail to bring in large sums of cash.
Canadian artists would be better off allowing the market to choose their fate. The road to success is much more difficult, but it would be their road. It would not be co-owned by some nameless bureaucrat with a do-nothing sense of worth. Entrusting the state to preserve the arts is a dangerous gamble as monopoly government is most often a destroyer of culture. G.K. Chesterton once wrote that tradition “means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead.” Modern democracy takes the opposite approach. It allows the masses to overturn past practices through the ballot box. Government-supported artists fight for subsidies to their own detriment. They are asking for their own insignificance in the form of looted treasure.