While the Fox report acknowledged that the bulk of the $80 million in stimulus funds the NEA received was going to "needy artists nationwide, and most of the money [was] being spent to help preserve jobs in museums, orchestras, theaters and dance troupes that have been hit hard by the recession," nevertheless, it pointed out that a small portion of the funds went to support "`pornographic' offerings such as an adult horror film shown at San Francisco's Frameline Theater, which is a gay-themed art cinema house that hosts an annual film festival," the Edge, a Boston, MA-based publication reported. (See http://www.nea.gov/recovery/grants/ARRA-direct-grants.php for a full list of NEA Recovery Act grants.)  

Despite the fact that the Edge noted that "the Frameline Theater was given $50,000 of stimulus money, a sum equaling one tenth of one one hundred and sixtieth of the money meant to be distributed by the NEA," several Religious Right groups were outraged.

The Fox piece was unclear about "whether or not the money went toward any screenings of the `pornographic' film ... titled "Thundercrack," which the article noted was described as `the world's only underground kinky art porno horror film, complete with four men, three women and a gorilla,' the Edge reported. In an e-mail, Frameline director K. C. Price wrote that "The grant is not intended for a specific program; it's to be used for the preservation of jobs at our media arts nonprofit organization over the next year during the economic downturn."

Another San Francisco arts outfit, CounterPULSE, which programs a "long-running pansexual performance series" that is advertised with an invitation to "join your fellow pervs for some explicit, twisted fun," received a $25,000 grant, according to the Fox News article. .

A third grant of $25,000 was given to the Jess Curtis/Gravity, which is currently promoting a "Symmetry Project." Jess Curtis/Gravity describes its symmetry project: "Two naked bodies interact through a highly structured improvisational score, constricted in a specific physical habit; that of moving symmetrically, relative to themselves or to each other. In this space of temporary `habitus,' the two bodies are constantly tuning, reformulating the perception of the self and of the other. In the sharing of a central axis, spine, mouth, genitals, face, and anus reveal their interconnectedness and centrality in embodied experience. Limbs entangle and intertwine creating an inter-corporeal kaleidoscope of flesh. A kind of uber-intimacy develops."

Fox reported that "more than 50 congressmen sent a letter blasting what they called "indecent" and "abhorrent" art projects funded by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts as part of the $787 billion economic stimulus bill." Although claiming that their "intent is not to censor artistic freedom," the letter (http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/073109_stearnsletter.pdf) written by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) and sent to NEA acting chair, Patrice Walker Powell, expressed concern "that taxpayers are stuck paying for projects that are antithetical to our values and culture. ...There is no justification for using tax dollars on the abhorrent projects. As such, the money should be immediately returned."  

For the Religious Right, attacking the NEA has always been money in the bank

The National Endowment for the Arts was established in 1965 through the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act. Its mission has been "to foster the excellence, diversity and vitality of the arts in the United States, and to broaden public access to the arts."

In the early 1990s, conservatives who had for a long time opposed any public funding for the arts - unless those funds were earmarked for a conservative legislator's district - bashing the NEA (and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) became a lucrative cottage industry. Not a week would pass without getting a hefty envelope in the mail from David Horowitz's then Center for the Study of Popular Culture (now the David Horowitz Freedom Center), Martin Mawyer's Christian Action Network, or Donald Wildmon's American Family Association.

My personal favorite direct mail package -- sent by the American Family Association -- contained a smallish envelope warning supporters to look inside at their own risk. Inside the envelope was a series of reproduced Robert Mapplethorpe photos. Mapplethorpe was a photographer who, according to his biography at the website of The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, extensively "document[ed] the New York S & M scene." According to Wkipedia, "Mapplethorpe's X Portfolio series sparked national attention in the early 1990s when it was included in The Perfect Moment, a traveling exhibition funded by [the NEA]. ... The portfolio includes ... a self-portrait with a bullwhip inserted in his anus. Though his work had been regularly displayed in publicly funded exhibitions, conservative and religious organizations, such as the [AFA] ... seized on this exhibition to vocally oppose government support for what they called "nothing more than the sensational presentation of potentially obscene material."  

Controversial artists in one way or another associated with NEA-funded projects -- Mapplethorpe, Andres Serrano ("Piss Christ"), the NEA Four (Karen Finley, John Fleck, Holly Hughes and Tim Miller), Joel Peter Witkin - were vilified by the Religious Right. Film festivals, small arts groups, and museum exhibits - whatever venues may have received NEA funding -- were scrutinized. The New York Guardian reported that an art project about U.S.POW/MIAs that dealt with U.S.-perpetrated atrocities in Vietnam had received NEA funding. The American Family Association criticized an NEA grant given to the National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture, which supposedly was used to help support three gay and lesbian film festivals.    

Martin Mawyer, the head of the Christian Action Network, a persistent critic of the NEA, greeted the nomination by President Bill Clinton of actress Jane Alexander to head the agency by saying that "We certainly don't think someone who is beholden to the interests of Hollywood should be chairperson of the NEA."

Alexander laid out her vision for the agency in remarks to the Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources: "I cannot promise that under my chairmanship the arts will be free of controversy. The very essence of art, after all, is to hold the mirror up to nature; the arts reflect the diversity and variety of human experience. We are, as Hamlet says, `the abstracts and brief chroniclers of the time,' and as such, the artist often taps into the very issues of society that are most sensitive."

In the Spring of 1995, the Christian Coalition introduced its "Contract with the American Family," which "argue[d] that the nation should 'abolish all major federal welfare programs' and turn them over to 'private and religious organizations'," National Public Radio's Daniel Zwerdling reported on the October 10, 2003, edition of PBS's "NOW with Bill Moyers." One of the Contract's provisions called for Privatizing the Arts ("The National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and Legal Services Corporation should become voluntary organizations funded through private contributions.") Interestingly enough, according to SourceWatch, a project of the Center for Media and Democracy, David Kuo, who was later to become Special Assistant to President Bush and Deputy Director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, helped draft the coalition's manifesto.  

While executive director of the Christian Coalition, Ralph Reed -- who currently heads up a new organization called the Faith and Freedom Coalition -- said that, "The government must no longer subsidize agencies and programs that promote values contrary to those we teach in our homes. Taxpayer funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and Corporation for Public Broadcasting should be terminated."

In the April 2001 issue of the AFA Journal, Wildmon, commented on an exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, involving photographer Renee Cox's exhibit entitled "Yo Mama's Last Supper," in which Cox portrayed Jesus Christ at the Last Supper as a naked woman. "Even if NEA funds are not specifically targeted for blasphemous art, the monies are fungible," Wildmon said. "That means, for example, they are placed in the Brooklyn Museum's general fund, which then makes other dollars available to give to so-called artists like Cox. Taxpayers shouldn't foot the bill for blasphemy."

"The NEA grants for self-identified pornography or an `inter-corporeal kaleidoscope of flesh' takes the affront to taxpayers to an entirely new level," The New American, the magazine of the John Birch Society maintained. "Pornography is objectionable to most Americans, and Thomas Jefferson once correctly observed: `To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.'"

In an interview with the conservative weekly Human Events, Rep. Stearns got in his licks against both the NEA and the stimulus package: "The fundamental question is this: Why is the federal government subsidizing `artists' that citizens refuse to support in the marketplace? We are funding bestiality and children appearing with nude adults. As to the economic stimulus rationale, there's none. There are no long-term jobs in this stuff. This is politics, political correctness gone awry. They're just funding pornography, and there's no legitimate reason for it.  And the American people understand that it is undermining our culture and glamorizing perversion on their dime."

The NEA currently receives about $190 million in annual funding.