NEA Controversy Calls For Action on Patrons’ Part

Four artists whose work has stirred the controversy surrounding the National Endowment for the Arts are no strangers to San Diego audiences.

Just last week, embattled NEA Chairman John E. Frohnmayer barred grants to the four, despite a recommendation for funding by an NEA panel.

The rejection should come as a shock to those lucky enough to have seen John Fleck’s comic performance as “The Granny” at the Old Globe Theatre in January. Or to those who savored the work of Karen Finley, Holly Hughes and Tim Miller at Sushi Performance Gallery.

Just how obscene did San Diego audiences think these artists were? The San Diego Critics Circle nominated Finley, a fiery and passionate performer, for its Best Actress Award, and Fleck received critical accolades for a virtuoso performance in the Old Globe’s popular “Granny.”

Finley and Hughes also drew the largest audiences Sushi has ever had, said its managing director, Vicki Wolf. Sushi has already booked Hughes for December and plans to invite Finley to appear in April. Wolf said Sushi, which receives $15,000 in NEA money, will not use any of that money to underwrite these artists.

The Times reported that, according to sources familiar with the situation, pressure to reject these artists came from the White House and Congress.

It’s amazing that the White House and Congress have nothing better to do than expend all their efforts in keeping a couple of thousand dollars from going into the hands of four nationally recognized artists. And why? No one is saying exactly, but, according to the sources, Miller got into trouble because he attached a personal statement with his NEA application criticizing Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), saying: “Look here, Sen. Jesse Helms, keep your Porky Pig face out of the NEA.”

Crude, granted. But don’t we have a First Amendment anymore? Or has it been amended like the commandments in “Animal Farm” to read that Americans can say whatever they like as long as it isn’t critical of Jesse Helms?

Hughes deals with lesbian subjects. Miller writes about gays. Finley is a feminist artist who, at one point in her performance, strips and smears her body with chocolate and alfalfa sprouts to make a point about women’s bodies being treated as objects.

Still, the real concern here is not whether these individuals get a few dollars from the NEA. The fear is, considering the political clout of those against them, whether they will get jobs in the future. Will today’s NEA shutout build the blacklist of tomorrow?

“I hope we are more enlightened than that,” said Thomas Hall, managing director of the Old Globe. “John (Fleck) is a consummate artist. There’s no doubt that John’s work here at the Globe and as a performance artist has artistic merit and deserved to be given every consideration.”

But these are the times that try enlightened souls. Will someone try to cut off NEA funds to companies planning to hire Fleck, Hughes, Miller or Finley? Will any company in this witch-hunting climate be willing to take that risk?

The list of NEA recipients who are rejecting their grants grows daily. These artists and organizations don’t want to be restricted in subject matter, style or content by what politicians tell the NEA is “obscene.”

In coming months, San Diego’s leading theaters, the Old Globe, the La Jolla Playhouse and the San Diego Repertory Theatre, along with other arts organizations here and across the nation, will have to decide whether to accept or reject NEA money.

Most nonprofit arts organizations came into being because of NEA money. They need it desperately. But how far should they be willing to compromise to get it?

Wolf said Sushi will accept its money because “we don’t believe we do anything obscene or pornographic. To not accept it would be exactly what the people fighting against us want us to do. It’s giving in.”

The tightly organized group railing against obscenity in the arts is becoming drunk with its own power. The protesters are winning, and their trophy will be either the NEA or its soul, because if the NEA lets Helms decide what is or isn’t art, or who can or can’t be hired, then the organization will become little more than a pimp for a few powerful politicians and the special-interest groups that pull their strings.

Art has never needed its friends more than now. Everyone who cares about the symphony, the ballet, the theater and freedom of expression should make his or her voice heard, whether it’s writing their legislators or organizing to counter the attack.

The NEA helped build the regional arts movement in this country. It improved quality here, and arts patrons no longer need to catch a flight to New York for an occasional culture fix. It deserves the support of the public--but, as the arts benefactor it was meant to be, not as a vehicle for censorship.

What the NEA has helped do for everyday life in America’s finest cities has been incalculable. Now it’s time to return some of that help to the NEA.

PROGRAM NOTES: The La Jolla Playhouse crisis campaign, which had a $1-million fund-raising goal to be met by June 30, raised $700,000 by that date. The campaign will continue through October. The 1990 season, which began auspiciously with a 101% attendance for “The Cherry Orchard” (the extra percentage point means standing room only), is secure, said managing director Alan Levey. Subscription sales have risen to an all-time high of 9,018, with a 68% renewal rate. And the deficit, which was $703,000, dropped to $633,000 as of Oct. 31, 1989, he said.

Levey also predicts that fund raising will get easier as the season continues and patrons can see the work they are supporting. “The Cherry Orchard” attendance figures are second only to the playhouse production of Lee Blessing’s “A Walk in the Woods,” which saw 109%. . . .

The Del Mar Theatre Ensemble, a children’s theater company that is opening its production of “Scapan” on Saturday, is desperately looking for a permanent home. Directed by Tony-winning William Ball, the company is working outside in the Del Mar Plaza at 1555 Camino Del Mar. Artistic director Bonnie Tarwater is hosting a fund-raising family dinner reception featuring Batman, Superman, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland and the Teenage Ninja Mutant Turtles at 2 p.m. Saturday. . . .

The San Diego Repertory Theatre is extending “Latins Anonymous” through July 15. . . .

Underground at the Lyceum continues with “Moment to Moment” today and Saturday. The Ensemble Arts Theatre’s “V*V*N” (for Vaudeville Viet Nam), an original work, will show at 10:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays from July 13-28. . . .

A reading of Judy Montague’s “The Zhabotinsky Reactions,” a story of modern gene engineering directed by San Diego Rep artistic director Douglas Jacobs, will be given at Words & Music Bookstore at 7 p.m. July 11, and at 8 p.m. July 23 at the Lyceum Space.