Dear Editor,

Thanks to Derek Walcott’s comments at Carifesta (SN August 25), everyone wants to know just how much Caribbean governments should be contributing to the arts. The answer, quite simply, is nothing.

To begin with, art paid for by the government becomes art controlled by the government and that means artistic ideas that challenge authority will be suppressed. In addition, government subsidies for art actually hurt creativity.

A recent study compared art in France, where artists are supported by the government, and art in the United States, where it is not. The study showed that the art in the United States was far more diverse and experimental because it wasn’t being held to government standards.

Finally, consider the artist. I’m sure that Derek Walcott would be the first to say that he would be a writer even if he made no money from it and if no one gave him any awards. Artists will continue to create whether or not they get recognition or money, so why should we demand these things from the government?
Let the government concentrate on cleaning up corruption and crime, on making things easy for investors, on maintaining the physical and legal infrastructure and on everything else that is needed to create economic development. The reality is that when the public is free from worrying about their basic needs, they will not only keep the arts alive, but see to it that they thrive.

Yours faithfully,
Imam Baksh