Quotes & Sayings About Funding The Arts

The unhappy irony is that, while 'Glee' is hitting the heights, school arts funding is being slashed across the country due to the steep recession and declining tax revenues. — James Wolcott

Support for the arts
merde! A government-supported artist is an incompetent whore! — Robert A. Heinlein

(This is why it is so frustrating that funding for arts programs in schools has been decimated. And those cuts stem from a fundamental misconception that art classes are about learning to draw. In fact, they are about learning to see.) Whether — Ed Catmull

This kind of compartmentalizing - separating one's livelihood from one's social aspirations - is part of the reason David Koch, the hidden hand behind a lot of ultraconservatives and, reportedly, the Tea Party movement in the United States, transforms himself into a respected arts patron by funding a theater at Lincoln Center, or why at Swiss bank that helps U.S. depositors avoid paying taxes generously supports symphony halls and the ballet. It's almost as if there are moral scales, and by tossing some loot on one side, you can balance out the precarious situation your reputation might be getting into on the other. — David Byrne

I think people all over the institution recognize that different ways of understanding are valuable. Artists may think in a different way than biologists or chemists, but you can learn something from that. It is true that the arts at MIT don't have the same amount of funding or same status as the sciences or engineering. — Alan Lightman

No matter what your political persuasion, you can find a guide that makes it quick, easy and painless to exercise your right to vote. Wanna know what a certain proposition put forth by a cadre of undisclosed billionaires which cuts funding for public education, arts and infrastructure means? Use the voting guide! — Steven Weber

[upon hearing that the school received funding for the football field, but not for any of the arts] Well, we might never have another Great American Novel or amazing musicals written by Americans, but at least we will always be able to toss a ball between some metal posts. Our priorities are right on track. — Chris O'Guinn

The great problem that the arts have always faced in countries where the populace has too great a say in their funding is that what is funded must reflect popular taste, and, as we in Russia know all too well, popular taste is seldom excellent. Here, we show them what is excellent, and they are grateful. — L.E. Modesitt Jr.

When Winston Churchill was asked to cut arts funding in favour of the war effort, he simply asked,'then what are we fighting for? — Kazuo Ishiguro

Funding for sports (and the arts) are often the first things facing the chop in difficult times. — Lucy Powell

We can become very short-sighted in terms of objectives. The first thing to go during times of economic crisis and budget cuts is funding for things that are essential and not-quantifiable, like the arts. Save Big Bird — Julia Stiles

I want to promote the introduction of art history in primary schools and to convince the general public that, even in a period of economic crisis, arts funding is an absolute necessity at the federal, state, and local levels. — Camille Paglia

This funding from the National Endowment for the Arts has been like the Good Housekeeping seal of approval. — Norm Dicks

I am adamant that we must not cut back on funding of the teaching of the arts in the schools: music, painting, theater, dance, all of it. The great thing about the arts is that the only way you learn how to do it is by doing it. — David McCullough

All the arts are predominantly national, and therefore the Australian Film Commission should be funding us. The battle gets more and more vicious each year. — Ann Macbeth

I see a resurgence of interest in poetry. I am less optimistic about the prospects for the arts when it comes to federal funding. — Rita Dove

What liberals mean by 'goose-stepping' or 'ethnic cleansing' is generally something along the lines of 'eliminating taxpayer funding for the National Endowment for the Arts.' But they can't say that, or people would realize they're crazy. — Ann Coulter

I'm a great candidate for why arts funding shouldn't be cut, because I had no experience other than what was at school, I'm from a working-class town, there were no theaters, and the cinema closed when I was a kid. Anything that gave me a voice or a way to express myself I went running headlong toward. — Ben Daniels

Jowell fell back on the same justification for funding the arts that the first chairman of the Arts Council, John Maynard Keynes, had deployed in 1945. Art was something produced by people with special skills, who set their own standards of excellence; they needed to be supported to do this, and the audience needed to be encouraged to appreciate this excellence, by being given subsidised access to it. And for all of Jowell's attempts to transcend instrumentalism, the purpose of culture continued to be to help the government 'to transform our society into a place of justice, talent and ambition where individuals can fulfil their true potential'.22 — Robert Hewison

It is not true that I oppose government funding of the arts. — Camille Paglia

Every budding dictatorship begins by muzzling the artists, because they're a mouthy lot and they don't line up and salute very easily. — Margaret Atwood