Page 5 - Conversation: Natalie Edgar .... / November

NE: The whole super-structure changed with the birth of the National Endowment for the Arts and when the colleges went into the business of manufacturing MFAs.

JW: Of which I was a product of, by the way.

NE: What I see as an ant, as a little artist, are these great super-structures. From such a perspective we don�t understand people getting these tax deductions, all these �not for profit� galleries. They�re really tied into corporate America and producing art that is supported by the government. It wasn�t about growing from the roots up but rather produced a lot of institutional art that sent artists directly into galleries. It happened very rapidly once the government got directly involved.

These days it no longer functions where you work for yourself and eventually hope to meet the public; to ring a bell. Like Melville. He wrote some peculiar things that rang a bell. I don�t see people working that way anymore; it�s seen as ridiculous.  Now people mostly talk is about how many books they have out, places they�ve been; they talk about careers.  The idea of a poet, of expressing yourself, must be brought out more because we�re being crushed.  And nobody likes what�s going on.

JW: A lot more so then was going on in the �40s and �50s?

NE: Well I would assume so. There were always very good careerists like Larry Rivers but still, he�s like an angel compared to some of the people these days.

JW: Well de Kooning was a great careerist too, right?

NE: Yeah, well you had a feeling that he was aware he had a great talent. You know, he wasn�t going to sell it short.

JW:  No, no, I didn�t mean that but rather there was some focus �

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NE: Everybody seemed to acknowledge the fact that he was good, you know, but I wasn�t really a witness to that.

JW: As I�ve become better informed it�s become apparent that there was an awful lot of struggle going on at that time as I mentioned earlier. I mean there was the physical stuff�

NE: No money.

JW: No money and no heat, no food. But more importantly, that there weren�t any galleries showing contemporary abstract art for a long, long time.

NE: There was Charlie Egan, the first guy that gave Bill a show when Bill was around 50 years old in 1948. And Charlie Egan was a member of The Club. He also had no money and was a complete distinction to Betty Parson�s Gallery, which was a well funded, with million dollar people in it. Charlie Egan had this shoestring gallery on 57th Street and he changed the thinking of the world because there was an audience for that kind of breakthrough; a hunger for it. At that time when you put on a great show, somebody knew it. I think today we all know you could put on a great show� I mean you could put the Mona Lisa out there and no one would notice (laughs).

JW: Right, right (laughs) because there was also a much smaller, more tight-knit community then.

NE: There was an appetite for it, you know?

JW: Well yes, and I think that clearly has to do with the times.

NE: But there was lot with other institutional forces that we didn�t know about; the museum of Modern Art, its connection to the government and so on.  As artists we had a tremendous power for awhile which, I think was because of The Club. Philip had organized it so that it really was a force.

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