To the editor:
On April 20, Manhattan Borough President Gail Brewer provided another art show (opening) venue of a diverse group of talented artists in her offices at One Centre Street. This display and sharing with New Yorkers of creative talent is a rare visual statement by a political leader of her high regard for the arts.
It indirectly reminds us of the deliberate removal of the art curriculum (music history, kinds, sounds), painting, sculpture, instrument and band playing, clothes design and sewing, et al, I observed as a working and retired NYC teacher.
The creation and sharing of the arts is what helps to keep us humanly connected and is a source of pleasure and inner epiphany that is becoming rare in an increasingly mercenary, pragmatic world.
The planned de-funding of non-commercial PBS, NPR and the NEA by Trump and the GOP (a crucial 139 million, half the yearly cost of a regular Presidential golf weekend in Florida) removing not only Sesame Street, Antique Road Show, Arts of other kinds, Charlie Rose, Ken Burns and various documentaries, but honest, objective reporting of crucial (and past) current events and is a clarion warning of the obsessive drive by conservatives for total control of voter’s minds.
It is refreshing and encouraging to see Councilwoman Brewer’s positive, real support of the arts, recognizing that technology will make us more comfortable, but won’t keep us sane in an increasingly stressful American scene.
Sy Schleimer