Open Letter to Robert M. Nash,
Executive Director of the Cultural Center of
Cape Cod
(From Issue #28, The
American Dissident)
As
a fervent free-speech proponent, who actively tests the waters of democracy
here on Cape Cod, I find your statement commendable:
The
Cultural Center of Cape Cod is a community-based organization that strives to
live up to its motto “All the Arts for All of Us” by offering a wide
range of events, exhibits, and educational programs. Everything that
happens at the Cultural Center of Cape Cod—everything it does and represents—is
predicated upon a democratic philosophy of inclusion,
encouragement, and accessibility. Everyone who comes to the Center with an
idea, question, or request is given the time, attention, and energy it takes to
consider all possibilities and address needs creatively and
compassionately. At the same time, the Center strives to maintain a level
of quality in its offerings that puts it among the area’s best galleries and
performing arts centers. Its goal is to encourage both excellence and
inclusion.
Sadly, however, the
waters of democracy on the Cape seem to be quite murky. Might
the Cultural Center waters be equally murky? Does “all the arts” include
my art too? Likely it does NOT. “Inclusion” pronouncements tend to
be fraudulently issued by cultural apparatchiks, poets and artistes of the
machine, political hacks, and Cape Cod library directors… you know, as in
“libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view,” but somehow
manage to permanently exclude points of view like mine. Director
Lucy Loomis, for example, permanently excluded my viewpoints from Sturgis
Library without warning or due process, proving the point.
These things
said, how about a show to counter your “Heavenly Bodies: The Human Form,
Transformed” exhibit called “Shaky Community Pillars: Business-as-Usual”
in which artists would submit work critical of local art apparatchiks,
librarians, chamber-of-commerce bureaucrats, academics, etc.? Why
is art so dull, predictable, and safe on Cape Cod? Why is it so
smiley-face and lacking in societal criticism? Why is it rarely, if ever,
art against the established order? Evidently, the latter has been quite
successful in coopting it. “Quality” and “excellence,” two highly
subjective terms, are evidently used to dismiss art of a critical nature.
Can I meet with you to propose an art and literary exhibit that would test the
veracity of your “inclusion” statement above? Your poet curator, Joe
Gouveia, has already proven it to be essentially untrue, so I thought I should
check with you before drawing my final conclusions. Thank you for your
attention and hopeful response. I’d be glad to come down to the Center to
meet with you. If I do not hear from you, I will come down to knock on
your door. Thank you for your hopeful attention.
[No response. Nothing like excluded inclusion!]
Open Letter #2 to Robert M. Nash
So, your non-response leads me to believe
that you are commonly thin-skinned regarding valid criticism and also
shamefully hypocritical regarding your very own statement, in particular, “All the Arts for All of Us” and “democratic philosophy of inclusion.” Clearly, you have
decided that I am ONE ARTIST NOT FOR YOU and YOUR CENTER, which clearly points
to the hypocrisy of your purported “inclusion.” Why feel compelled to
jabber about INCLUSION when you must certainly know in your hearts that by
nature you wish to be EXCLUSIONARY? As a perhaps rare intellectually
honest person, I do have great difficulty understanding the COMMON CULTURAL
APPARATCHIK. How about helping me in that endeavor? When will you
be available to meet with me at YOUR Cultural Center… in the name of
INCLUSION? Please do respond! I am a taxpaying citizen of
Barnstable… and you are receiving tax funding.
[No response. No accountability. Culture as Usual...]
These things said, how about a show to counter your “Heavenly Bodies: The Human Form, Transformed” exhibit called “Shaky Community Pillars: Business-as-Usual” in which artists would submit work critical of local art apparatchiks, librarians, chamber-of-commerce bureaucrats, academics, etc.? Why is art so dull, predictable, and safe on Cape Cod? Why is it so smiley-face and lacking in societal criticism? Why is it rarely, if ever, art against the established order? Evidently, the latter has been quite successful in coopting it. “Quality” and “excellence,” two highly subjective terms, are evidently used to dismiss art of a critical nature.
Can I meet with you to propose an art and literary exhibit that would test the veracity of your “inclusion” statement above? Your poet curator, Joe Gouveia, has already proven it to be essentially untrue, so I thought I should check with you before drawing my final conclusions. Thank you for your attention and hopeful response. I’d be glad to come down to the Center to meet with you. If I do not hear from you, I will come down to knock on your door. Thank you for your hopeful attention.
[No response. Nothing like excluded inclusion!]
[No response. No accountability. Culture as Usual...]
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