34LMLFQ@CMUVM.BITNET (Chris Curtis) (02/28/90)
Since there's been discussion on the list of whether the NEA should fund art, or even exist, I thought this little snippet might be of interest. I'm about 2 months behind in my _Rolling Stone_ reading, so I just got to this last week (I refuse to read them out of order; you never know what people are complaining about in the letters section! :) ). In our usual form, it's taken w/o "official" permission from the magazine. If any are interested by this clip, I'll post the entirety of the article later. It's by P.J. O'Rourke from the "Irrational Affairs" section: There was a big flap over National Endowment for the Arts funds being used to exhibit Robert Mapplethorpe photographs, including a self-portrait of the artist with a bullwhip handle up his butt. Senator Jesse Helms fought for legislation banning expenditures of government money on obscene art. Congressional liberals argued against Helms, saying that with a law like this, not even Rembrandt would be able to get NEA funds for a self-portrait with a bullwhip handle up his butt. A compromise was finally reached forbidding government money to be spent on sticking anything up the butt of Senator Jesse Helms. _Rolling Stone_, December 14th-28th, 1989 :-) Chris