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

The statement asserts that some people believe that government funding is necessary for the arts to flourish and be available to all people, and some people believe that government funding of the arts could be a threat to the integrity of the arts. In what fallows, the spectrum of views will be discussed, and in the end, my position will be delineated.

To begin with, some people believe that government financial intervention in the arts would be hazardous for the integrity of the arts. Government like every other institution of power, those people believe, seeks its own interests and capitalizes on art; when it comes to fund arts, governments are prone to discriminately choose those arts which are better aligned with the taste of the government. Hence, they conclude, art in that case becomes tastelessly predictable, limited to especial governmental red lines, and in one word becomes a political advertisement.

Consider an Ideological governing system like North Korea. This communist government, mainly supports the arts which are somehow related to the ideology of socialism that in turn would be an advertisement for the governing system. This, not only has marginalized arts not having a communist theme, even merited works with communist themes_ the funded arts_ seem obsequious work for the government, in the eyes of artists and people. In this country, any work of art which has an aroma of capitalism is doomed to be ruled out to be funded.

On the other side of the spectrum, many are those believing that governments by providing platforms and proper grounds should take a step in flourishing the arts and making it available to all people. These people believe that without the participation of the government in the background, prospective artists might not be able to develop their talents by their own. To illustrate this view, consider a weaver of the Persian carpet in Iran. Such a task takes a long time to be done. Governmental aids help a weaver artist to persevere in her or his long term of seating and weaving, sometimes taking a full year of working. Otherwise, the artist is prone to fail to keep on the long weaving process.

Finally, as far as I’m concerned, I tend to agree with the latter spectrum of thinking with one qualification. The qualification is that funds should be indiscriminately provided for the experts to disperse it among the artists; with the indirect backing of the government in terms of funding art specialists_ who has no political inclinations_ to in turn help the artists, arts can better flourish and not be corrupted. As the last example clearly attests, if the government do not back such a national art, then whose responsibility is it? The artist himself or herself should wait such a long time to finish weaving, and then it is not a guarantee that the carpet sells soon. This is where the arts needs the governmental aids, to facilitate being flourished.