“There is a pampered class of artists in the United States,” concedes Gioia, who got to know a wide range of creative types during his years as NEA chair. “But it’s tiny. And they make insignificant money compared to sports people. We have this Puritan, practical tradition in the United States. Puritans would give to the poor, but not to the idle. Artists are seen as these idle dreamers.”

More typical than a celebrity artist feasting on enormous grants, he says, is someone like Morton Lauridsen, who is now one of the most performed living composers – after decades of scraping by, teaching and writing choral works. Or a writer like Kay Ryan, who, until becoming U.S. poet laureate in 2008 was known to only a small few. “She never applied for a grant, never taught writing,” Gioia says. “She taught remedial reading at a community college.”

It was the Coast Guard Academy band, in New London, Conn., that allowed Kelli O’Connor, a conservatory-trained clarinet and saxophone player, to make a living. These days she’s a principal in a nearby orchestra, plays with a chamber group at a Boston church, coaches at area high schools and teaches at the University of Rhode Island: None of these pay a full salary or significant benefits. “Freelancing is a hustle all the time,” she says. “You master the art of scheduling. Squeezing in as much as possible. There are some days when I’m not done until 11 or 12 at night, and then I have to get up at 7 in the morning.”

Like most musicians, she teaches private lessons, but her students have fallen by more than half. “Because of the economy, it’s really gone downhill. People are afraid to spend their money. You’re constantly sending your C.V. to local schools to stir up interest.”

The source for new music discovery and free MP3 downloads from the best emerging bands.

The truth about the images from my trip in 1988 is that not one image from that body of work has ever been included in any of my portfolios. Not one image from that trip has ever been published. I did sell a few awful prints to people who must have felt sorry for me. But the bottom line is that I had laid an absolute photographic egg. I had visited some of the most beautiful landscapes on the planet and in over 7000 clicks of the shutter had not even gotten lucky.

Conventional wisdom would say I had seriously failed the ultimate photography aptitude test. Conventional wisdom would also say I should give up on what looked like a dead ringer for a pipe dream and move on to something else. I clearly was lacking a "natural ability of a superior quality". In fact my trip was almost proof that when it came to photography, I had something closer to a natural ability of an inferior quality. But true wisdom would say that as a beginner I had done the only thing I was capable of doing.

he Staffordshire Hoard is an unparalleled treasure find dating from Anglo-Saxon times. Both the quality and quantity of this unique treasure are remarkable. The story of how it came to be left in the Staffordshire soil is likely to be more remarkable still.

The Hoard was first discovered in July 2009. The find is likely to spark decades of debate among archaeologists, historians and enthusiasts.

So despite its genuinely impressive technical innovations, Avatar isn't much a movie: Instead, Cameron's cooked up a derivative, overlong pastiche of anti-corporate clichés and quasi-mystical eco-nonsense. It's not that the film's politics make it bad, it's that even if you agree, the nearly three-hour onslaught of simplistic moralizing leaves no room for interesting twists or ambiguity in the story or characters: corporations are bad, scientists are good, natives are pure, harmony with nature is the ultimate ideal — the only suspense comes from wondering what movie Cameron will rip off next. The go-to comparison so far is Dances With Wolves meets Ferngully, and that's just about right. But Cameron rips himself off considerably as well: There are gruff marines are straight out of Aliens, stubborn science-types pulled from The Abyss, and a love-across-the-boundaries romance that echoes Titanic — only this time, it's across species rather than ship decks.

Bravo Greater Des Moines (Bravo) is a nonprofit organization committed to strengthening the metro area's arts and cultural community as a key element of a world-class quality of life.

Bravo provides a collaborative focus to nurture and grow the arts by increasing funding through public and private sources.

Patrol is a post-evangelical journal of culture and politics.

Now that the Library of Congress and NASA and the New York Public Library all have their collections online, there are more copyright-free pictures around than you can shake a stick at.

Wunderkammer Magazine exists to provide a thoughtful examination of culture and society. It is founded on the belief that in order to fully understand what it means to be human, we must understand the era in which we live.

Wunderkammer takes its name from the eclectic, encyclopedic collections of the old nobles which served as microcosms of a baffling world, demanding examination and inspiring curiosity from its viewers. Just as those collections varied in scope, the magazine engages art and culture, technology and education, politics and society, religion and travel. Through thoughtful essays, reviews, and interviews on these topics, Wunderkammer hopes to be a witness of the age. Its goal, as the great English poet W.H. Auden wrote in his poem, “The Horatians,” is to “look at this world with a happy eye, but from a sober perspective.”

A design and screen printing studio focused on mentoring students to produce excellent work for the benefit of others.

There are 178 people in the picture, all shot in the course of 20 days from the same spot on a railroad bridge on Warschauer Strasse in Berlin in the summer 2007. Only few of the people on the photograph seemed to know I was taking their picture.

The Curator launched on August 29, 2008 as a web publication of International Arts Movement (IAM), which announces the signs of a “world that ought to be” as we find it in our midst, and seeks to inspire people to engage deeply with culture that enriches life and broadens experience.

In keeping with IAM’s belief that artistic excellence, as a model of “what ought to be”, paves the way for lasting, enduring humanity, The Curator seeks to encourage, promote, and uncover those artifacts of culture – those things which humans create - that inspire and embody truth, goodness, and beauty.

Unfortunately, many Christians have allowed themselves to become so estranged from contemporary culture that they have essentially given up any hope of influencing the artists who will create the visual images, stories, and music that shape our time.

Few Christians have applied the concept of "stewardship" to culture itself. While it has been natural for Christians to see themselves as stewards of natural resources, or wealth, or the institutional church, there has been little sense of stewardship over our national culture.

Image speaks with equal force and relevance to the secular culture and to the church. By finding fresh ways for the imagination to embody religious truth and religious experience, Image challenges believers and nonbelievers alike.