American Canvas

What's all the fuss about? Critical reaction from the front page of The New York Times, editorials in The Nation, and the Chronicle of Higher Education greeted the NEA's American Canvas report on America's cultural condition. American Canvas is a dry 193 page assessment of the arts at the end of Jane Alexander's reign as National Endowment for the Arts chair. The New York Times controversial interpretation of American Canvas paints the arts in America as an essentially elitist activity. The Times assessment was criticized in The Nation as basically missing the entire point of American Canvas. The elitist/populist debate has raged since the early years of the NEA and this new eruption stirred up by American Canvas is just the latest controversy concerning arts and its relationship to our society. Early discussion in the elitist/populist debate centered on "access to the best." Today's debate focuses on high culture versus popular culture. One suggestion made in American Canvas is to broaden the current definition of arts to include not only the non-profit professional and commercial arts but also the avocational, community-based, and emerging arts organizations as well as their artistic experiences, products, and activities. The current narrow definition of what constitutes art and artistic expression is probably too narrow if we want to show society how art affects everyone everyday. We need to keep in mind that non-profit arts activity and its revenues are dwarfed by the commercial arts of film, television and the recording industry. Together these arts activities prove that our cultural environment is vast and filled with many providers. In cities, towns, and country villages throughout this nation arts activity is flourishing and remains an important element in millions of American lives everyday.

American Canvas consists of nine chapters that explore the current state of the arts in our country:

Improving the Climate for Culture

Transmitting Our Cultural Legacy

The Evolving Cultural Landscape

American and the Arts

Culture and Community

Arts and Education

The Arts and Telecommunications

Seeking New Solutions

The Challenge to Act

American Canvas points out a number of problems that the arts face, in particular, arts education. For every arts education failure out there, a success story can also be found. It is through these successes that a new heritage and foundation for arts education can be built within our communities. Education has and continues to be a local concern. Parents, grandparents and local citizens must insure that their communities provide the best education possible for their children. The arts are an essential element in the educational mix and the arts will continue to be used for many different educational objectives and goals. Many communities both large and small offer today's students better arts education and arts experiences than their parents received when they attended school. Those schools need to continue their excellent work. The schools that currently lack a solid arts education for their students need to do a better job.

Key arguments for arts education support made in American Canvas include:

~ The arts are important as a subject in themselves.

~ The arts enhance the study of other areas of the basic curriculum.

~ The arts are relevant to the acquisition of vocational skills.

~ The arts contribute to family unity and growth.

~ The arts offer skills that will be useful as we move further into the Information Age.

~ The arts serve those with special needs, including those who are in danger of falling through the cracks of our educational system.

(Chapter 1, p 5-6)

American Canvas agrees with the 1993 Arts Education Partnership Working Group report The Power of the Arts to Transform Education that schools with strong arts programs benefit in the following ways:

~ Intensified student motivation to learn;

~ Better attendance among students and teachers;

~ Increased graduation rates;

~ Improved multicultural understanding;

~ Renewed and invigorated faculty;

~ More highly engaged students (which traditional approaches fail to inspire);

~ Development of a higher order of thinking skills, creativity, and problem-solving ability; and

~ Greater community participation and support

American Canvas is important for one basic reason: it raises the debate about the role of arts in our society. It has also gained national attention and elicited widespread response. I don't always agree with its points or style of presentation but it succeeds when it engages Americans in a discussion of the role of arts in our society, sets some goals and establishes an action plan to attain those goals. American Canvas stresses collaboration and partnerships as a primary means to solve many of the problems facing the arts. Meanwhile, artists will continue to struggle for their piece of the pie and dream. At the same time, the future for the arts does not look all bleak but appears to be a continuation of more struggles, fantastic accomplishments, and spectacular failures shared by all Americans.

Kevin Marshall