Watching the Democratic National Convention last night, I was struck by one of the most significant but rarely discussed aspects of a potential Obama presidency.  Barack Obama would be the first president in memory - to my knowledge the first since Teddy Roosevelt - to come from an urban background.  He grew up in Honolulu and has spent time in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, and Boston.  This isn’t merely a biographical curiosity.  It contributes to an unprecedented focus on urban policy for a major national politician.

America’s cities are stereotyped either as enclaves of effete, intellectual socialists or as concrete wastelands packed tight with welfare-dependent leeches.  Authentic American individualism and entrepreneurship comes from the midwest, right?  Not so much.  The reality is that our cities provide massive subsidies to rural America.  This is perhaps best illustrated by a report from the Tax Foundation showing a breakdown of which states receive the most federal aid compared to their tax contribution and which receive the least.  (If you’re feeling feisty, check out this hilarious but informative rant from the day after the 2004 election.)

Over the coming years, America’s dependence on its cities is only going to grow, and our cities are going to play a bigger and more important role in the 21st century economy than they have in decades.  Mainstream policymakers are finally starting to understand the creative economy - which is inextricably linked to urban environments - and its potency as an engine for economic development.  Cities are hotbeds of creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship.  At the same time, rising fuel costs and environmental consciousness highlight the benefits of mass transit and population density.

Yet the myth of rural/suburban authenticity and urban sloth is so entrenched that politicians with ambitions to national office wind up tripping over each other in an effort to see who can most shamelessly pander to the farm lobby.

All of this goes to show why it’s significant that Barack Obama has quietly made urban policy a centerpiece of his campaign platform.  His urban policy plan contains some of his most detailed prescriptions, including symbolic steps such as the creation of a White House Office on Urban Policy and major investments in things like public-private business incubators.

The Obama campaign has published an arts platform as well, but I believe its ultimate potential impact on the arts community would not be as great as that of a more broad-based investment in America’s cities.

Cities provide the social context for so much of our collective artistic output.  Yet rising real estate prices, deteriorating infrastructure, and a host of other problems are driving artists from cities like New York in droves.  Some are landing in places like Philadelphia that are savvier and more progressive regarding urban cultural policy.  But many others are bidding farewell to the US altogether and heading for foreign cultural hotspots like Berlin.

Retaining a vibrant arts and cultural sector in American cities won’t require massive public subsidies or a huge increase in the NEA’s budget.  Artists are experts at making do with very little and generally rise to the challenge when given a chance to prove their worth through merit-based processes.  What we need is a proverbial level playing field.  In part, that means paying our cities even a fraction of the attention we’ve historically paid to rural America.

P.S. - Mainly out of genuine curiosity but also in the interest of fairness I did some research on John McCain’s urban policy and arts policy positions.  Alas, it turns out that he doesn’t have either (at least not published by the campaign).  The only comments I could find from McCain on urban issues were, uh, a bit scary.

Here in NYC, the idea of setting aside affordable housing for artists is considered politically poisonous. The reasoning is that as soon as you designate housing - our city’s most precious and sought-after resource - for a particular occupation or industry, then the flood gates inevitably open. “Why not affordable housing for nurses, or firefighters, or teachers?” the people will say.

I’ve heard this argument again and again from elected officials at the city and state levels. Even organizations like the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs and the New York State Council on the Arts buy into this facile reasoning.

Thankfully, not everyone is so shortsighted. Luis Cancel, the newly appointed Director of Cultural Affairs for the City and County of San Francisco has come right out of the gate declaring that affordable housing for the city’s artists is a top priority. (Amazingly, the city hasn’t yet crumbled to the ground!) Cancel is actually a long-time New Yorker, where he has a 25-year history of arts administration and advocacy, mostly recently as Executive Director of the Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural Center.

I wonder if the powers that be in New York realize just how close the city is to being permanently displaced as America’s great cultural powerhouse. Chronically ignoring basic infrastructure needs while relying on ever-fading memories of Greenwich Village in the 1950s isn’t what I consider a viable long term cultural policy.

Ian Moss at Createquity makes a compelling case for arts philanthropy that focuses on infrastructure and avoids self-perpetuating cults of personality:

I don’t think it’s incumbent upon foundations to judge artistic merit. There are plenty of other people in this world who are perfectly capable of doing that, and arguably more qualified: curators, journalists, other artists, audience members themselves. Where foundations can add value instead is in setting up and supporting systems by which artistic activity is generated in their communities.

This makes a lot of sense to me, and not just from a self-interested standpoint. Let’s pull back for a second and get some context. Institutional funders, especially the old guard stalwarts, are notoriously risk averse. A common strategy (whether conscious or unconscious) for reducing the likelihood of misguided grants is to establish funding legacies. Funders identify successful individuals or institutions and fund them year after year, often for the same or similar activities.

This is an understandable impulse. Identifying and nurturing new visions is difficult work. Today’s avant garde is next year’s status quo, so you’re perpetually on a treadmill. Some people thrive on that kind of challenge, and I applaud them for their service. But the best discoverers of artistic talent, nine times out of ten, are working directly in the field as producers, promoters, curators, etc. I should confess that I spent several years trying to do that myself, and while I won’t admit to complete failure, suffice it to say that if I had been good enough at that kind of work I’d probably still be a producer today.

The most important decision I ever made at Fractured Atlas was our late 2001 shift from a curatorial strategy to a wide open one. By accepting that I lacked the vision or wisdom to reliably identify the next Jackson Pollack or even Richard Foreman, I democratized our whole approach to supporting the arts community. The new goals were about leveling the playing field by providing resources and tools that reduced the likelihood that real talent would be squashed by bad luck or poor access to vital services. Ultimately Fractured Atlas helps our industry’s “market forces” function more effectively by limiting the often significant impact of non-artistic factors (e.g. healthcare, funding, technology).

At the risk of tooting my own horn, I can report with confidence that this approach has worked surprisingly well. I’ve seen talented but undiscovered members in our fiscal sponsorship program go from raising $500/year to $50,000/year. When the work is good enough, money finds it. We just grease the wheels by handling the non-artistic stuff like IRS compliance and charities bureau filings.

Popular clichés notwithstanding, genius doesn’t get “discovered”. It makes itself known through perseverance and artistic quality that is compelling enough that it gets people talking. But for the system to work we need a healthy ecosystem. Infrastructure matters. Resources matter.

Which brings me back to Ian’s post… He’s essentially advocating a similar philosophy from a philanthropic perspective. By trusting “market forces” and investing in our industry’s infrastructure, institutional funders can maximize their impact while reducing their exposure to curatorial risk. It’s less sexy than playing Lorenzo de’ Medici, but then again it’s also less likely to get you stabbed in a Cathedral.

Happy New Year!