Some people believe that government funding of the arts is necessary to ensure that the arts can flourish and be available to all people. Others believe that government funding of the arts threatens the integrity of the arts.Write a response in which you

The prompt seemingly raises a debate between opposing parties, with the former claiming that government subsidy to the arts is necessary to guarantee that the arts can flourish and be accessible to all people, and the latter arguing that government funding of the arts makes the integrity of the arts unwarranted. However, even a cursory analysis of the two statements would reveal that there is no inherent tension between the two statements at all, because the former is a claim about the necessity of government patronage to the arts, while the latter one is assuming a certain kind of negative impact of government funding on the arts which can be obviated. I believe that both statements have raised valid points, and the latter one needs some qualification.

For starters, it is indisputable that government endowment to the arts is necessary and can make arts available to all people. The reasons are listed as follows. First, government funding is conducive to the establishment of museums, which can help people to get in touch with a myriad of ancient art works closely and know how invaluable the arts are as well as the origin of culture without being charged for entrance. For example, the National Museum, which is patronized by the government, has become a youth basement where provides exhibition of ancient artifacts for free. All citizens can acquire chances to learn more about the arts in this museum. Second, government may offer financial support to the education of art. For instance, the majority of middle schools provide art courses for all students, such as painting and music classes. All material used in such courses, such as pens and books, are free for all students with the subsidy of government.

Having clearly stated that the government funding of the arts is surely of necessity, now let’s evaluate whether the government patronage to the arts will threaten the integrity of the arts. It cannot be denied that the arts’ integrity may not be warranted when they are patronized by the government under certain scenarios. The nature of the arts should be the expression of some real emotions of the artist, while this kind of emotional expression sometimes may be distorted when the artists are confined to the requirements of the government, which makes some art works seem politics-oriented. For example, National Endowment for the Arts, an independent agency of the U.S. government that supports the creation, dissemination and performance of the arts, once forced the patronized art work regarding the theme of homosexuality to change as required. Also, the majority of films and musics in North Korea are served for political goals like arousing hero worship. Both of the aforementioned examples can reveal the fact that sometimes the government funding of the arts interferes the purity of the art works.

However, we should avoid carrying the statement to the extreme. While the government subsidy to the arts may sometimes threaten the integrity of the art works, this phenomenon will not happen all the time if the government funding is aimed at the whole industry of the arts rather than single art work or artist. Establishing the art districts can be seen as an exemplar of this. For instance, the 798 art district in Beijing is subsided by the government, but it is free for all kinds of art forms without being meddled by the government. Besides, the government can also help the art industry by reducing tax for the art works. In 2018, the government of China adopted laws to reduce 15 percent of the tax rate of the industry of arts and culture, which will not interfere with the purity of art works.

To sum up, government funding of the arts is certainly beneficial to the dissemination and development of the arts and it will not threaten the purity of the arts if handled properly.