Q & A : John Frohnmayer’s Rough Ride

John E. Frohnmayer has just completed the halfway mark of his first term as chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, in what has been the most tumultuous--and controversial--period in the agency’s history.

The 49-year-old Oregonian, who was chairman of his own state’s arts commission from 1980 to 1984, has been attacked by both the right and left, pilloried by fundamentalists and gays and sued by four controversial performers whose applications for grants he rejected in 1990.

A likable, soft-spoken man who holds degrees in history, law and Christian ethics, Frohnmayer is an accomplished singer who has been active in the art world for much of his adult life.

During a meeting with Los Angeles-area artists in Hollywood last January, Frohnmayer conceded that he had “screwed up” the handling of a grant that later sparked a ruckus, and suggested that the current hubbub over art may be part of a broader reordering of society.

Here, in an interview with The Times, the chairman assesses his first two years in office, defends the right of artists to express themselves freely even if federal tax dollars are involved, and says he believes that the NEA has “won” the battle over restrictions.

But he also concedes that there is some “lingering suspicion” on the part of some artists and artists groups and warns that there is a “very poisonous atmosphere” in the continuing debate.

Here are some excerpts from the conversation:

Question: You’ve just celebrated your second anniversary as chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. Have things turned out about as you had expected?

Answer (laughing): Well, the debate has been a little more intense, and certainly has lasted longer than I would have expected it to last. I thought that at the end of the 1990 reauthorization, Congress had dealt with the issue--had received a report from the presidentially appointed independent commission, which suggested strongly against content restrictions, and basically had made the bifurcation between obscenity decisions belonging in the courts and artistic decisions belonging in the arts endowment. So I was more than a little surprised at the re-emergence of interest in Congress in content restrictions as reflected by the most recent proposed amendment (introduced by Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.)).

Q: Were you surprised as well by the fact that the debate has gone on this long?

A: Yes. If you’d asked me in August of this year, I would have told you that I believe the debate has moved on and the issues now are in quality of art and fairness of procedures. But it’s difficult to see, given the latest round, that we’ve made any progress at all over the last three years. People are still criticizing artists that they haven’t seen on the basis of second- and third-hand reports. The word obscenity is not used in any kind of legal sense but is used as a term meaning something that that particular person doesn’t like. It’s a very poisonous atmosphere.

Q: You said you were afraid that things may not really have changed very much as a result of the past two years’ debate. Where do they stand today?

A: The agency is appropriated for another year at a budget level of about $176 million. We presently don’t have content restrictions. The 1990 reauthorization legislation is still in effect, which puts obscenity decisions in the courts and artistic decisions in the agency. But there is a real specter of continued assaults on the endowment, primarily fueled by some hard-right conservative groups--both religious and otherwise--who are for the most part propagating misinformation.

Q: May we back up just a minute and ask: Why should the federal government be in the business of subsidizing art at all?

A: Because it’s one of the few areas in which the federal government looks out for the soul, the creative genius of a country. We as a country aren’t simply the sum of our military might and our economic output. As the enabling legislation of the endowment says, the United States ought to be a leader in the realm of ideas and of the spirit. That’s what the endowment is here to promote.

Q: Some critics have contended that when an artist accepts public money, he--or she--shouldn’t expect to have a totally free hand anymore. After all, that argument goes, it’s taxpayers’ money, and that sort of implies some form of moderation, whether it’s in added sensitivity by the artist or whatever. What do you think of that approach?

A: I disagree with it. My view is that the government provides a soapbox. It is an enabler. It is the artist who has the ideas, who exercises the speech. It is an index of the strength of a government that provides that platform without limitations.

Q: So, then, you’re saying that in an ideal world there shouldn’t be any limitations--that an artist should be free to do whatever he wants, even when his work is being financed by tax dollars?

A: Of course there are limitations. There are limitations on speech, and those are basically three: The First Amendment protects the speaker in all instances except criminal activities--fraud, bribery, forgery, that sort of thing. Second, in dangerous speech, which is (yelling) fire in a crowded theater, or fighting words. And finally, obscenity. Except for those limitations, the First Amendment protects the speaker. It seems to me that part of the debate has gotten off track because people have been advocating protecting the audience. That’s not what the First Amendment’s about.

Q: You have mentioned the need for “sensitivities.” Is what you’re suggesting that an artist should consider the political ramifications of what he does before he goes off too far?

A: No, I’m saying that in my view an artist has some responsibility to articulate what it is that she or he is trying to do to help the audience understand. Some art is very confrontational--meant to be, and serves a purpose that way in helping our society to confront issues that we might not be very willing to confront. But it seems to me that it’s not just enough for us--the endowment or the artist--to simply plop it down there and say to an audience that may not understand it, “Well that’s your fault, that’s your problem.”

Q: You’ve been quoted as having said that you believe that political considerations have to be taken into account in some grant decisions.

A: No, actually I was misquoted as having said that. That came out of Seattle. I remember exactly the time. Someone else quoted me as saying that, but I immediately said that I didn’t say it, and I didn’t.

Q: What did you say?

A: In that instance, I said very much what I said to you earlier. That is that artists can’t expect that the public will appreciate difficult art without some help from the artist, and that there is a responsibility to recognize that in a political world, if you want your art to resonate, you have to do something more than just throw it out there. That statement was made in late June of 1990. The political reality at that time was (that) whether there would be an arts endowment was very much in doubt.

Q: As you know, in 1990 the endowment rejected applications by two performance artists, Holly Hughes and Tim Miller, whose works contain gay and lesbian messages, leading both of them to file suit against the NEA. But this year, their applications for grants were approved. Were this year’s projects any different from those you rejected the previous year?

A: Substantially. The record was far, far clearer this year than it was last. Both of their artistic statements were far clearer, more articulate, more persuasive this year. The comments of the (peer) panel this year were far more specific than they were the prior year. And perhaps the greatest difference, the National Council (the endowment’s advisory body) was unanimous with one abstention in recommending the grants this year, whereas a (council) majority voted against those grants last year. So there was a substantial difference at every level. Better information and reliance upon procedure.

Q: Current law requires you to make grants on the basis of a project’s artistic excellence and artistic merit, taking into consideration “general standards of decency” and respect for the “diverse values and beliefs” of the American public. In practical terms, what does that mean for your decision-making process? Does having to adhere to those standards pose problems for you in deciding on which applications to approve?

A: It hasn’t to date. The part of giving grants on the basis of artistic excellence and artistic merit has been what we have always done, and that’s why we have experts in every panel that we construct, and educated lay persons. But in terms of taking into account general standards of decency and respect for the diverse values and beliefs of the American people, the way we have implemented that is to put together panels that are very diverse in geographics and gender and racial or ethnic background and points of view. And in bringing that kind of a panel to the table, we bring in that kind of diversity and that kind of decency that represent the American people as a whole.

Q: You seemed to have hinted that the continuation of the debate beyond what you expected had required that you spend a good deal of time on the controversy. Is there anything that this burden of having to cope with the debate constantly has prevented you from doing so far that you might otherwise have liked to?

A: I suspect that the attention I’ve had to pay to the ongoing siege atmosphere has taken its greatest toll in my ability to form partnerships with businesses and foundations and other communities for the joint delivery of arts. I’ve had very little time to sort of put those programs together, and I regret that very much--although we’re making some progress in that regard now.

But as I look back on the last couple of years, I guess I wonder at how much we have been able to accomplish, even given all of the rockets that have been going up and the controversy that has been so continuing.

Because we have made some real progress in a number of areas, of which I’m very proud. I think there has been a great deal accomplished here.

Q: If you could put an end to the debate and instead focus your attention on an agenda for the remainder of your term, what would you like to do?

A: I would like to persuade those who really care about education that the arts ought to be central to the curriculum. Arts education is not recreational, it’s not secondary, it’s not nice if you have a lot of money and a lot of time. It’s critical to the process of learning to think, of learning to be a productive citizen, of learning to make connections of disconnected items, which is the real substance of genius.

What I hope we will be able to do is to point out the schools that have achieved real academic success on the basis of an arts curriculum, and demonstrate that those schools are the break-the-mold schools that so many people are looking for. If we can do that, if we can show that arts education is really critical not just to a better educated citizenry and more able citizenry, a citizenry that includes the skills that the Department of Labor says are necessary for people in the job market, then we will have accomplished two things. One, we will have improved the education en toto of the United States; and secondly, we will have improved the appreciation for the arts in the United States.

Then there’s one other thing I would mention, and that is the climate for the individual artist. In the census, it is our belief that individual artists were undercounted substantially. Because the way the census worked is, if you considered yourself to be an artist, say an actor, but you made more than 50% of your income driving a cab, then you would be listed in the census as a cabdriver.

The life of an individual artist is extraordinarily difficult in the United States for all but a few. I am hopeful that over the course of the next decade we can improve the lot of the individual artist. Both in terms of better marketing of skills--in firmer support for companies which hire artists on a full-time basis--and in assistance to those artists that work in typically a solitary environment such as writers or visual arts.

Q: What kind of relationship do you think you have now with the “arts community”--and do you think that needs patching up in any way?

A (laughing): Some people say the phrase arts community is an oxymoron. I think that my relationship with the institutions and the states and locals is really quite good. I think there is some lingering suspicion on the part of some individual artists and some of the groups that represent individual artists.

My response to that would be that I am establishing a procedure here that will be followed. It guards against a process that is unpredictable. That is the greatest assurance against any kind of (political interference). . . . It means the process will not be fickle. It means the process will be understandable, which is to say if the panel recommends you and the council recommends you, the chances are very good that you’re going to get the grant. I think that’s where some of the confusion arose with individual artists in particular. If one of those doesn’t (recommend), then I’m going to have to make up my own mind.

There is, I guess, a fairly understandable degree of paranoia in the arts world, particularly in the very tenuous existence of the individual artist, where you are so susceptible to a bad review or somebody who willingly or ignorantly misunderstands your art or mischaracterizes it. I really believe that for the good of the individual artist and the good of the country both, we need to try to make the climate for the individual artist more nurturing. It’s a tough life. I think anything we can do to make that environment better for the individual artist is worth doing.

Q: We were talking before about the debate and the fact that it’s still going on long after you thought it might have abated. I wondered if you had any apprehension that the controversy might become a permanent fixture, the way the abortion issue appears to have become--that is, whichever side you’re on, it becomes such a focus for so many people that overall it sometimes gets in the way of other things?

A: In some sense we have won the debate, in that even our most vitriolic critics have agreed that 99-and-44/100% of what we do is nothing but admirable and beneficial. That I consider to be a significant victory. But that doesn’t mean that the debate won’t sort of niggle on in all sorts of ways. But my sense is that the debate is really about the nature of differences and the nature of tolerance in a society that is increasingly bifurcated. I really believe that the arts are part of the solution to help us see each other as we are and find our commonality, because that’s the future of this country--not the rigidity that is preached by either the hard right or the hard left.

Q: Would you like to stay on for another term?

A (laughing): We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.