A year ago I was in my first class pursuing a masters in museum studies. I have always loved museums of all kinds and I really wanted to make a mid-life career change to pursue that love.
It only took a few weeks in the class to learn that I, your standard issue straight white guy, am extremely unwelcome in the museum world. I dropped out and haven't been back since. And I just stopped going to museums completely. Why participate in a culture that hates me?
If only we could have “blind entries” into museums and galleries like they used to do for orchestras. ‘Blind auditions’ where you could not tell if it was a man or a woman playing, and you only judged by the sound of the music.
Of course we could never use the term blind audition anymore. This is all very sad.
Excellent overview and a timely critique. I have a number of friends that grew up in Eastern Bloc Communist countries, and they could all provide numerous examples about what happens when "ideology" becomes State Orthodoxy. In a capitalist system like ours, institutional "foundations" serve the same purpose as Eastern European censorship departments did. In most cases, artists, musicians, film makers and writers weren't actually locked up, they just were given no possible avenue to share their works.
Fantastic essay Franklin. The issue you raise about grant funds being distributed based on identity rather than artistic merit is important for people to know about. I’ve found that grant applications also sometimes require the applicant to confirm allegiance to a set of ultra-left ideologies just to apply. We need new funding sources that allow anyone to apply, regardless of political ideology. Think of all the works of art we are not seeing because the applicant was turned away for not being willing to agree with someone else’s political ideology.
Thank you, Kevin. I think that art audiences are largely in the dark about the ideological excesses of the institutions, but word is getting out. We certainly could use some more sources of funding that weren't captured. Legal action against the biggest institutional offenders should at least be on the table.
This was really eye-opening, thank you. I love museums and galleries. I have no useful knowledge of art and can only delineate the most obvious genres. But I am moved by beauty and very distressed to find that to not be a criteria for what is displayed. What is being produced now that will stand the test of time? If an artist has to pander to a niche in order to find an audience, what truth will we find in their works?
Affluent White Liberal Women are doing the same exact thing the straight men of all races have done. They think this will save them. Unfortunately, it won't. And, it will destroy all of society. The hierarchy at that point will sort itself and there will be no art involved.
The Gay art field has almost totally imploded in a similar manner, and it’s been funny to be inside it as it reruns to a patronage model instead of a gallery model it toyed with. I started buying in my 20’s with a single discriminating idea. The image had to have a penis, preferably erect.
Always problematic, it illustrated a fundamental problem in gallerist art - that almost everything was bought by men. Any work of art with a penis - god forbid it’s erect - automatically drops in value, if a gallery could even sell it at all. Joel-Peter Witikin, Mapplethorpe, Hujar, Andres Serrano and others - where are they?
A photographic erect penis - say a Peter Hujar - is an impossible objet. Now that effectively women run the field, the problem shifts from men’s insecurities to women’s insecurity with the directness I suspect. So we have Elton John as a patron for an exhibition, thanks Luv.
Trying to buy gay male art has been an exercise in futility to be honest. It is slowly returning to its roots in fetishistic and private views of what is barely spoken of, though the “love that dare not speak its no name” rarely shuts up about child-absorbable rainbow memes.
The idea of a modern Shunga, a renewed “Tom of Finland”, a male-focused Helmut Newton - impossible objets.
You’re probably familiar with Thomas Wolfe’s “The Painted Word” from 1975 - naive but prescient in some ways.
It's something that's been happening to me over a long period of time. I used to be very active in the arts community in Canada. But as I expressed myself reasonably about certain ideas, I found that I got fewer and fewer invitations to things. This is also true because of the CoVid situation. Many in the arts community left me behind due to my view of things.
Wonderful piece. I live in Austin, TX, perhaps the most "progressive" city in the south/southwest. We have never had a strong visual arts scene, despite the juggernaut University of Texas' presence.
I have an MBA and a Masters in Arts Management. When I was earning these degrees in the late 1990s, we were still being taught to promote art for arts' sake. There was a new excitement around presenting Latin American composers' music onstage or creating exhibitions of African sculptors, but the field wasn't yet dogmatic or Marxist about it -- just refreshing old things and seeking new audiences.
Now I have zero interest in any temporary or traveling exhibits in US cities because they're all performative and didactic, as Franklin said. They're never about beauty or talent. And paying money to look at something in person that is not even beautiful, transcendant, or expertly done, is stupid.
Recently I saw an IG post by the leader of a local rockabilly revival band, who is well-loved locally and has done a great deal for her genre. She was bemoaning the fact that, despite all the months of work to apply for a arts grant from the city, her group had been turned down. Why? She was told the proposal wasn't "diverse enough". "How much more diverse could we get?" she complained. Her band includes numerous races and sexual orientations. But their leader is white, and they are making zero political statements with their music -- just devoting themselves to the revival of an American genre. They aren't writing screeds against the police (whom our city council defunded), having drag queens gyrate during their concerts, or the like. No grant money for them!!
The censorial, performative, NeoMarxist left is destroying the culture and shaping our (artless) future. Thank you for speaking up, Franklin!
Rejecting, downgrading or discriminating against art, regardless of quality, because it is "too white," "too Jewish," or too anything of the sort is automatically and utterly discrediting, especially if the perp presents or operates as a so-called art person. As in, don't make me laugh and spit on your reputation, standing and supposed importance. The matter is not at all subtle. So many poseurs and charlatans.
This all sounds increasingly soviet. Communist autocracies used censorship and adherence to communist ideals to warp the arts that were considered appropriate.
A year ago I was in my first class pursuing a masters in museum studies. I have always loved museums of all kinds and I really wanted to make a mid-life career change to pursue that love.
It only took a few weeks in the class to learn that I, your standard issue straight white guy, am extremely unwelcome in the museum world. I dropped out and haven't been back since. And I just stopped going to museums completely. Why participate in a culture that hates me?
Thank you.
If only we could have “blind entries” into museums and galleries like they used to do for orchestras. ‘Blind auditions’ where you could not tell if it was a man or a woman playing, and you only judged by the sound of the music.
Of course we could never use the term blind audition anymore. This is all very sad.
This is an excellent idea. Orchestras no longer use blind auditions?
Not sure…..
Exactly what I was thinking. This is incredibly ridiculous.
Excellent overview and a timely critique. I have a number of friends that grew up in Eastern Bloc Communist countries, and they could all provide numerous examples about what happens when "ideology" becomes State Orthodoxy. In a capitalist system like ours, institutional "foundations" serve the same purpose as Eastern European censorship departments did. In most cases, artists, musicians, film makers and writers weren't actually locked up, they just were given no possible avenue to share their works.
Fantastic essay Franklin. The issue you raise about grant funds being distributed based on identity rather than artistic merit is important for people to know about. I’ve found that grant applications also sometimes require the applicant to confirm allegiance to a set of ultra-left ideologies just to apply. We need new funding sources that allow anyone to apply, regardless of political ideology. Think of all the works of art we are not seeing because the applicant was turned away for not being willing to agree with someone else’s political ideology.
Thank you, Kevin. I think that art audiences are largely in the dark about the ideological excesses of the institutions, but word is getting out. We certainly could use some more sources of funding that weren't captured. Legal action against the biggest institutional offenders should at least be on the table.
This was really eye-opening, thank you. I love museums and galleries. I have no useful knowledge of art and can only delineate the most obvious genres. But I am moved by beauty and very distressed to find that to not be a criteria for what is displayed. What is being produced now that will stand the test of time? If an artist has to pander to a niche in order to find an audience, what truth will we find in their works?
Affluent White Liberal Women are doing the same exact thing the straight men of all races have done. They think this will save them. Unfortunately, it won't. And, it will destroy all of society. The hierarchy at that point will sort itself and there will be no art involved.
I’m afraid the same thing is going on in publishing:
https://philosophyandfiction.substack.com/p/are-publishers-afraid-of-controversy?r=schg4
I’m seeing numerous articles like this standing up for artistic freedom, which is a good sign. I for one have been waiting a long time.
Nicely outlined and filled in.
The Gay art field has almost totally imploded in a similar manner, and it’s been funny to be inside it as it reruns to a patronage model instead of a gallery model it toyed with. I started buying in my 20’s with a single discriminating idea. The image had to have a penis, preferably erect.
Always problematic, it illustrated a fundamental problem in gallerist art - that almost everything was bought by men. Any work of art with a penis - god forbid it’s erect - automatically drops in value, if a gallery could even sell it at all. Joel-Peter Witikin, Mapplethorpe, Hujar, Andres Serrano and others - where are they?
A photographic erect penis - say a Peter Hujar - is an impossible objet. Now that effectively women run the field, the problem shifts from men’s insecurities to women’s insecurity with the directness I suspect. So we have Elton John as a patron for an exhibition, thanks Luv.
Trying to buy gay male art has been an exercise in futility to be honest. It is slowly returning to its roots in fetishistic and private views of what is barely spoken of, though the “love that dare not speak its no name” rarely shuts up about child-absorbable rainbow memes.
The idea of a modern Shunga, a renewed “Tom of Finland”, a male-focused Helmut Newton - impossible objets.
You’re probably familiar with Thomas Wolfe’s “The Painted Word” from 1975 - naive but prescient in some ways.
It's something that's been happening to me over a long period of time. I used to be very active in the arts community in Canada. But as I expressed myself reasonably about certain ideas, I found that I got fewer and fewer invitations to things. This is also true because of the CoVid situation. Many in the arts community left me behind due to my view of things.
Wonderful piece. I live in Austin, TX, perhaps the most "progressive" city in the south/southwest. We have never had a strong visual arts scene, despite the juggernaut University of Texas' presence.
I have an MBA and a Masters in Arts Management. When I was earning these degrees in the late 1990s, we were still being taught to promote art for arts' sake. There was a new excitement around presenting Latin American composers' music onstage or creating exhibitions of African sculptors, but the field wasn't yet dogmatic or Marxist about it -- just refreshing old things and seeking new audiences.
Now I have zero interest in any temporary or traveling exhibits in US cities because they're all performative and didactic, as Franklin said. They're never about beauty or talent. And paying money to look at something in person that is not even beautiful, transcendant, or expertly done, is stupid.
Recently I saw an IG post by the leader of a local rockabilly revival band, who is well-loved locally and has done a great deal for her genre. She was bemoaning the fact that, despite all the months of work to apply for a arts grant from the city, her group had been turned down. Why? She was told the proposal wasn't "diverse enough". "How much more diverse could we get?" she complained. Her band includes numerous races and sexual orientations. But their leader is white, and they are making zero political statements with their music -- just devoting themselves to the revival of an American genre. They aren't writing screeds against the police (whom our city council defunded), having drag queens gyrate during their concerts, or the like. No grant money for them!!
The censorial, performative, NeoMarxist left is destroying the culture and shaping our (artless) future. Thank you for speaking up, Franklin!
Really well written article, and echoes my own experience of trying to get a foot in the door in the theater, film & audiobook worlds.
Rejecting, downgrading or discriminating against art, regardless of quality, because it is "too white," "too Jewish," or too anything of the sort is automatically and utterly discrediting, especially if the perp presents or operates as a so-called art person. As in, don't make me laugh and spit on your reputation, standing and supposed importance. The matter is not at all subtle. So many poseurs and charlatans.
Sadly depressing but thank you for the overview.
This all sounds increasingly soviet. Communist autocracies used censorship and adherence to communist ideals to warp the arts that were considered appropriate.
Fine piece.
Art should be free from politics, but the communist destroy everything.
Have my podcast on predictive programming in movies here:
https://spotifyanchor-web.app.link/e/wOpITAsW4Mb