#cultural-policy

#cultural-policy

President Warren G. Harding was calling for a return to "normalcy"-a word whose resonance in today's political rhetoric suggests a familiar retreat-as the nation grappled with sweeping social, political and cultural shifts. The Harlem Renaissance was flourishing; racial violence, such as the Tulsa Race Massacre, laid bare deep racial divides; and artists like Edward Hopper and Georgia O'Keeffe were redefining American art.

The president's statement comes as the White House undertakes a four-month review of exhibitions, programmes and internal processes at eight of the Smithsonian's 21 museums: the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of Natural History, the NMAAHC, the National Museum of the American Indian, the National Air and Space Museum, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

"It's a momentous turning point," says Sirio Ortolani, the president of ANGAMC. "Italy can finally become a great international hub, attracting galleries from all over Europe and major fairs."

"What knits our communities together is the opportunity to hear each other, to hear differences of opinion, to understand how we're different and how we're similar, and that's what builds the ground on which democracy can grow."

On the other side of the Atlantic, powerful players in this industry are hostile to the French cultural exception. One could worry about the alignment of this agenda with that of the new American administration, but I'm not worried.