In March of this year, the permanent collection of the Musée National d’art Moderne — the National Modern Art Museum — of Paris closed its doors for five years. Consecrated as the Centre Georges Pompidou, this modern art museum has housed a large collection of avant-garde art from the early 20th century since 1977. The Pompidou center represents the history of the avant-garde in Paris and the promulgation of modern art as a national art form. Such a closing of a historic collection has been disheartening to say the least. Despite the varied personal opinions of modern art, there is no denying the historical impact of this art style as a social movement.

Oftentimes the closing of such cultural and educational institutions encourages us to speak about the local social impacts, yet here I would like to enlarge the frame. In the midst of a shared global conservative populist movement, President Donald Trump has recently slashed grants for the National Endowment for the Arts. Whether there is disagreement on the motives for such economic decisions, the fact remains that the institutions meant to preserve educational and cultural involvement in the United States are suffering in the occidental wave to the right. I would like to explore the recent actions of Trump and the closing of the National Modern Art Museum of France in conversation with one another.

The closing of the National Modern Art Museum of France has been discussed at length in anglophone and francophone publications. In review, the museum and its component parties such as the Bibliothèque publique d’information, the National Library, will be closed until 2030 to remove asbestos and remodel the museum. This closure has caused some outrage in Paris, calling for the renovations to be reconsidered. The Centre Pompidou serves the Parisian community on a daily basis, offering an educational space that provides public access without inscription, identification and fee. I believe such an environment should not be closed to the public during such global conflict. Similarly, the history of the Centre Pompidou speaks to the preservation of the avant-garde. The avant-garde artists of France often spoke out against fascism, racism and sexism. While there exist notable exceptions to such a statement, the surrealists, dadaists and fauvists all shared anti-authoritarian ideologies that encouraged a populist perception of art. In this context we see how such a closing of this museum speaks to an actual reduction of such arts.

Moving towards the reduction of art, in January and February the Trump administration slashed funding and grants for people of color and LGBTQ+ artists as a part of the National Endowment for the Arts. The National Endowment of the Arts was established in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration as a part of a national movement to increase artistic excellence in the U.S. Since its establishment, the NEA has given grants, fellowships and jobs to artists through federal funding. Of course, there have been previous controversies involving several artists, such as Robert Mapplethorpe and Andres Serrano in the 80s, which have called into question the funding of the NEA. Despite such controversy, the federal office has withstood time and will celebrate its 60th anniversary this year. However, Trump’s executive orders on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, as well as “gender ideology” have threatened artists who rely on grants from the NEA. For example, The Art Museum of Americas has canceled exhibitions of Black artists from the Americas.

Unfortunately, this is not a new pattern of federal funding and the arts have been suffering nationally and globally from a disinterested political climate. I want to stress two effects I find troubling. The movements of modern art from the 19th century onwards were for the representation of the people. I recognize that may not have been every artist’s motive, but the interrogation of representation through not just subject but also aesthetic ideas places society in question. When the government reduces and  rejects art, it also inherently excuses itself from its actions. This is the first effect I find difficult to accept. The Trump administration, yet more largely the trend of economic conservatism, is removing itself from the witness stand, pardoning itself from the public forum it is duty bound to serve.

My second concern addresses the art itself. Artists should represent a diversity, a multitude, a constellation of life experiences, identities, mediums and stories. An artist is not only someone who creates but someone whose work anchors itself in the moment it is conceived. Each piece of art is from that which it came and to that which it inspires. When we place restrictions on what is acceptable, art reduces itself. My concern involves the future as well. How will a future generation of artists create from such a restricted framework? 

Artists will survive of course; it is our nature. I encourage you to go and create art, participate in the action of conceiving a piece. Experience the journey of distinguishing a singular moment of time in material work, expressing yourself and your past, guiding your future. There are people who aim to stop us from speaking, I encourage you to take to the chisel in defiance.