Uphill idealist

Creative Arts of Women of Western NY is doing a great job of jazzing up life by lifting up women artists! Coming on March 31st, the community of Jamestown, NY will be celebrating SWAN day (Support Women's Art Now) I'm honored to have one of my paintings in this wonderful show and to be featured in today's Women Create blog segment. My friend and amazing photographer Heather Mencer took the photos of me for an additional photo flag book that is in the works of being compiled for this upcoming Art Show. Thanks for supporting the arts - they have a way of jazzing things up don't they?

Arts programs are in a precarious state. Literally, millions in funding are in the process of being potentially eliminated. There even is a danger of the National Endowment of the Arts to be eliminated entirely. See this excerpt from the Advocate for the Arts... This week, the U.S. House of Representatives will bring to the House floor, a Continuing Resolution (CR) appropriations package that proposes to cut dozens of federal agencies and programs for the balance of the current 2011 fiscal year (March 5 through September 30). The National Endowment for the Arts is targeted for a $22.5 million cut in the legislative proposal, and it is quite possible members of the Republican Study Committee will offer amendments to fully eliminate the NEA during floor consideration. ( From Advocate of the Arts ) Do you recall the cartoons by Schoolhouse rock? I do. In fact without this "artistic medium of teaching", I'm not sure I'd ever understood the process of a bill becoming a la...