Ex-NEA Head Requests Session of Arts Advisers : Arts: On-going crisis prompts unusual request. Grants to five authors stalls amid sensitivity to political, sexual content.

A former chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts has called for a special session of the endowment’s advisory council to try to resolve the new political crisis threatening the government arts agency.

Livingston Biddle, who served as the endowment’s third chairman from 1977-81 and remains close to influential arts policy leaders in Congress, made the proposal over the weekend. In a telephone interview, he urged a special meeting of the 24-member National Council on the Arts, augmented by a panel of distinguished artists who have served as council members--a total of about 40 arts experts.

Meanwhile, The Times learned that the sensitivity to the political or sexual content of artworks under review for endowment support has stalled action on grants to five authors being considered for literature fellowships--one of the endowment’s most distinguished programs.

While the fellowship applications may eventually be approved, endowment sources said there was growing concern that the hesitation over the literature grants was another indication of a chilling of artistic and creative freedom of expression at the endowment.

“I’ve always said that art by its very nature is controversial if it is to be on the frontiers of new expression,” Biddle said of the underlying causes of the crisis. He said the special session could call national attention to the issues and arrive at a solution in which the arts council could defuse the dispute.

“I don’t think this issue has been addressed by a responsible body of artists of that caliber yet,” Biddle said. “Let them debate this issue, which is fundamentally freedom of expression.”

The risk, Biddle said, is that the current firestorm, in which the endowment has rescinded a grant to an AIDS art show because of the exhibit’s alleged political tone, may rapidly destroy the agency’s credibility with the nation’s creative community.

Biddle specifically suggested that violinist Isaac Stern, actor Gregory Peck and conductor Leonard Bernstein be asked to serve.

The endowment is already about to undergo a review mandated by Congress. A 12-member commission, of which only four members have been named, is to conduct a six-month study of the agency. But Biddle’s proposal was unrelated.

Biddle’s suggestion and disclosure of hesitation over the literature fellowships came days after endowment Chairman John E. Frohnmayer impounded a $10,000 grant to a New York City art gallery that plans to open on Thursday night a show focusing on the AIDS crisis.

The show, at the gallery Artists Space, involves some sexually explicit photographs and a politically provocative text by artist David Wojnarowicz, who is himself dying of the disease. After Susan Wyatt, the director of Artists Space, called Frohnmayer’s attention to the fact that the show, which includes work by 23 artists, could be controversial, Frohnmayer rescinded the grant. He said the “political” nature of the show’s commentary on the plight of AIDS victims was unacceptable under content restrictions imposed by Congress.

In a telephone interview, Wyatt urged enraged artists (who began over the weekend to formulate protest plans) not to condemn Frohnmayer personally.

“I don’t want to destroy him, and I don’t want to destroy the endowment,” Wyatt said. “There are a lot of people who are angry that he’s done this,” she said, “but I still like him, and I think we respect each other.”

Frohnmayer is tentatively scheduled to fly to New York Wednesday to meet with the gallery’s board. He is to be formally sworn in by President Bush at a White House lunch today and was not available to reporters over the weekend.

The newly disclosed delay in action on the five $15,000 fellowships resulted from concern by Frohnmayer that writing samples submitted with the grant applications contained thematic or stylistic elements that might be considered obscene. The nature of the writing could be in conflict with anti-obscenity sanctions added by conservatives in the House and Senate to the arts agency’s 1990 appropriation bill.

Sources familiar with the situation declined to identify the five authors, but endowment fellowships generally go to writers of note. It was learned that Frohnmayer separated the five grants from a larger group of applications reviewed on Nov. 4 and 5 by the national council and asked members to read the materials.

The council, The Times learned, unanimously recommended that all five fellowships be approved. The possibility that the grants might be rejected on obscenity grounds reportedly provoked a spirited discussion in the council--which reviews grant applications in closed session. In the end, however, according to one source familiar with the debate, “the point was made (by council members), ‘What are we about?’ ” if they were turned down.

But the council recommendation is not binding on Frohnmayer. Endowment sources said that, while it appeared Frohnmayer was initially hesitant to approve the grants, there were indications by the weekend that he would endorse them.

Wendy Luers, a New York City writer and arts advocate and a member of the national council, supported Biddle’s proposal for a special session of the endowment’s advisory board. She said additional council action might help find a solution to the endowment’s political problems.

Luers said she believes that the crisis that resulted from the Artists Space show grant was unavoidable in view of the action by Congress that outlawed grants for “obscene” art unless it meets what the endowment chairman perceives as artistic excellence.

“If it wasn’t this grant, it was going to be something else,” Luers said. “This is unenforceable legislation.”