Volume 6 Number 5 November 2006

> ART & POLITICS

I don't like having to write this, or think it, but... VAA has "lost" more clients over the past 20 years due to what are perceived by some as being my "right wing" political positions (versus "beliefs") than from any other cause.

It is as if when I do not absolutely cling to the precise orthodoxy of the American Left or Democrat party, then, somehow, my professional judgement is automatically called into question.

It also is, as if, to be in the art profession one MUST not be what I am perceived to be!

I even had one client withdraw from VAA services because, in his words, "You allowed yourself to be baptized!"

I have also had a museum Director inform me that because I would not, as a curator, countenance ANY defilement of the American flag in a gallery display, my "objectivity" was in question.

When with those whom I had thought were "friends", they speak of most social matters in hushed tones, if at all, when I am near.

Thank heaven I never take a similar approach in judging whether or not I wish to work with a client.

How sad... how terribly, terribly, sad.