Art is not for the weak.

My parents, Puerto Rican artists via New York and Puerto Rico, gifted me and my brother art to soften the destructive blows of poverty. In 1993, Bread & Roses Community Fund awarded my father the Paul Robeson Social Justice Award (now the Paul Robeson Lifetime Achievement Award) for his efforts weaving art, direct service, politics and community organizing towards addressing poverty in Philadelphia. As my dad accepted his award and began unfolding the pages of his speech, he stopped, took a breath and acknowledged that he needed a second to collect himself. Moments before my father was introduced to the audience, award-winning poet Sonia Sanchez gifted us a poem that elicited an emotional reaction he could not hide. Art is not for the weak.?

Fast forward to just a few weeks ago, I jumped in an Uber at Broad and Erie to get to work. Moving south on Broad Street, passing the now shuttered Uptown Theater, eventually stopping at the intersection of Broad and Master streets, I stared at the 19th-century brownstone home of the Freedom Theater. As I waited for the light to turn green, I was flooded with childhood memories of those beautiful doors standing open; young Black and brown youth hurrying up the stairs or just hanging on the stoop, watching Philly go by. I was envious of those kids. They looked confident, important; purpose filled.

Before reaching my office, I asked myself two sobering questions: 1) Are workers almost done removing Isaiah Zagar’s iconic wall installation that defined Painted Bride Art Center for years? and 2) is it me or are the amount of works presented at The School District of Philadelphia annual young artist exhibit becoming fewer and fewer??

On June 1, 2024, the University of the Arts abruptly announced its closing. I called my father to ask how he was feeling. His alma mater had finally succumbed to perceived and actual attacks on the arts.?

We reflected on how art ensured our family survived Philadelphia in the 80s and 90s. The art-based organizations we called home, like Taller Puertorrique?o were community-led, politically motivated, intergenerational and unapologetically Puerto Rican, Black, or Asian. These spaces were loved and ‘uncontrollable,’ making them a threat to a social order rooted in controlling critical thinking and criticism of those with decision-making power. Staff in these spaces understood how to work with poor and affluent white folks without compromising their cultural and political values and identities. They understood that the only way to thrive while surviving poverty was to integrate the arts into the social safety net. They understood that these spaces were powerful testimonies to resilience. I miss these spaces.

Today, my heart breaks for art and their home institutions. Not only because I know how starved for resources the sector is but also because I am witnessing a sustained, systematic attack on the arts rooted in authoritarianism and white supremacy.

I am not saying that every funder has to fund the arts. However, since I sit, professionally speaking, in philanthropy, I am saying that if art is not for the weak, we as one of the most powerful sectors in the nation, a sector responsible for billions of charitable dollars, should not require art-based funders to take on the weight of this issue alone. We should treat it with the seriousness it requires and deserves. We should explore more intentionally how aspects of art can positively impact all our grantmaking institutions and the very same social service organizations we fund. Then create strategic plans or poverty fighting strategies accordingly. Only then can we say we tried everything to fight poverty.