NEA Funding Decisions

I was most interested in the staunch defense of the National Endowment for the Arts by choreographer Bill T. Jones (Opinion, April 27). Not too long ago, Jones and his NEA-funded troupe treated an unsuspecting Tucson audience to what must have been the most elaborate stage display of full frontal nudity ever seen here. I’m sure the outrage of audience members who left would have been compounded had they known that not only their ticket prices but their tax dollars had financed the event.

Jones defends the NEA by asserting that artists shouldn’t “resort to facile tactics of shock or titillation.” But art of specifically that stripe is exactly what has brought down public wrath upon the endowment, which certainly has the potential to do all the good that Jones claims it accomplishes.

The Muscular Dystrophy Assn. tried futilely to induce the NEA to assist its art collection of works by artists with disabilities as a means of better enlightening the public about the tremendous capabilities of this important segment of our society, and to inspire people with disabilities themselves. The NEA turned us down. MDA doesn’t side with those who’d bring down the endowment, but it certainly would like to see a realignment of its priorities to bring them into congruence with the values of we whose money it’s spending.

ROBERT ROSS, Senior Vice

President and Executive Director

Muscular Dystrophy Assn.

Tucson