On Saturday, June 22, 2002, at 08:01 AM, David H. Bailey wrote:
> Can you name one poet that has come out of NEA support to achieve > national recognition (that didn't already have national recognition > before receiving NEA support)? No, because I have only recently moved to the United States and while I was in Canada I didn't keep track of who got an NEA grant and who didn't. I can, however, name you some Canadian authors that only came to national (and international) recognition either after having received Canada Council grants, or having won a national competition sponsored by the Canada Council (such the Governor General's Literary Awards), or after being published by a publisher who receives Canada Council grants: Margaret Atwood Margaret Laurence Robert Lepage Malcolm Lowry Alice Munro Michael Ondaatje Gabrielle Roy Carol Shields Lise Tremblay Jane Urquart Gilles Vigneault Now, you can argue that some of these people would have eventually achieved recognition for their work even without public arts funding (if we want to speculate about possible worlds), but it would be awfully difficult to claim that *all* of them would have done so. One thing that is certain -- if support for the arts in Canada were limited to the whims of the market, there would be much *less* of everything -- fewer books published by Canadian authors, fewer recordings made by Canadian musicians, fewer films made by Canadian filmmakers, and so on. As an artist, especially as an artist whose work places him outside the mainstream, it takes time to get noticed. Most people are not risk-takers, and this permeates everything they do, including their approach to art. Most people will not see a film unless they know lots and lots of other people have seen or will see this film. A very few people are risk-takers and are willing to take a chance on a film that doesn't have ads in every bus shelter in town and is only playing in a single run-down art house cinema. But it is difficult to even reach these people, your potential audience. Risk-takers by their very nature an elusive demographic and resistant to traditional advertising. (This is both good and bad.) It can be done, but it takes time. Atom Egoyan is a good example. He had been making movies (and television) for fifteen years before he finally broke through with _Exotica_, his first profitable film. Working in Canada, there is simply no way he would have been able to build up the experience necessary to make _Exotica_ (or even get the funding for _Exotica_ in the first place, even though it did end up being profitable) without the government-assisted film industry we have in Canada. He would have either been forced to forget about making films (after all, unless you are enormously wealthy, it's not possible to make movies in your spare time, on your own nickel) or move to the United States and pursue a filmmaking career there. - Darcy ----- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Boston MA _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
