An installation of Karen Finley’snthat was being shown at New York’snFranklin Furnace in July when all thisnbroke was also NEA-funded, accordingnto Furnace spokeswoman Barbara Pollack.nNo doubt those were real tearsnMs. Finley sobbed to the crowd atnJoseph Papp’s Public Theater whennshe told them, “I am suffering.” She isnfighting for a very significant portion ofnher income.nShe may be winning. Ms. Finleynand Ms. Hughes’s other rejected applications,nin the Experimental category,nwere to be reconsidered in November.nArdis Krainik, general director of Chicago’snLyric Opera, told the papers innsupport of the two that “You knownwhose side we’re on. This will comenup in November and it will be fairlyntreated” — seemingly a promise thatnthe funding will go through. Indeed,nby an unanimous vote the Councilnreversed itself on its May decision notnto give money to the PhiladelphianInstitute of Contemporary Art, whichnstarted this whole mess by funding thenMapplethorpe exhibit.nMultiple grant-getting is not limitednto theater people. In January the NEAnawarded a $20,000 “American JazznMaster Fellowship” grant to GeorgenAllan Russell, who had already receivednthree NEA Music fellowships.nThe fact is, rules against doubledippingnor on-going funding of certainnfavorite artists are lax or nonexistent atnthe NEA. The Literature programnseems to be the most strict: you maynnot apply for both a creative writingnfellowship and a translation fellowshipnin the same year, you may not apply fornthree years after receiving a Literaturengrant, and you may never receive morenthan three Literature fellowships overnthe course of a lifetime.nIn the Theater program, the applicationnstates that performance artistsnand mimes may not be funded fornmore than five consecutive years,nthough this sentence is qualified by an”generally” and there seems to be nondifficulty in nonsequential funding.nAnd getting, say, a Performance Artngrant this year in no way precludes younfrom getting a Dance grant next year.nThis seems to be what Tom Miller hasndone. What limits there are at thenNEA are only within categories ofnprograms, not within programs (exceptnLiterature) or across the board.nWhat seems to happen more often,nthough, is that producing organizationsnwill apply for a grant that will includenmonies for, say, a Karen Finley performance.nThe money is granted to anplace like Franklin Furnace or ThenKitchen in New York, which will keepnsome of the money for overhead costs,nleaving the rest to be paid to the artist.nThis is how Serrano received his grant:nit was a subgrant given to him by anWinston-Salem group.nWhen asked if arts organizations listnon their applications whom they plannto include in their presentation series,nNEA spokesman Kathy Christie replied,n”They do. But then, too, sometimesnthey haven’t been able to schedulenit all for the year and they have tonget back to the Arts Endowment. It’s anlittle on the muddy side, but most ofnthe time the Arts Endowment, by thentime everything is done, knows exactlynwho’s done what.”nReferring to Karen Finley’s multigrants,nMs. Christie says that as forn”one person getting eight or ninengrants — they did not; they got maybena fellowship here and a fellowshipnthere.” In other words, because FranklinnFurnace received the $20,000 ofnwhich $1,000 went for Ms. Finley’snJuly show, that should not count as anNEA grant to Karen Finley, evennthough she was paid with NEA moniesnto perform. The question is, of course,ndoes floating the money through anproducing organization, rather thanngiving it directly to the artist, mean thatnKaren Finley’s chocolate-smearing hasnbeen any less tax-supported?nAs George Garrett pointed out innhis July Chronicles article on arts funding—nand as someone who has sat onnthe Literature program expert panelsnhe should know — given the tremendousnnumber of applicants who arenrejected, what does get funded is notnfunded by accident.nNaturally, that is especially truenwithin individual programs like Literature.nBut do the various programs talknto each other? According to Ms. Christie,n”All the Hme.” So Dance presumablynknows that they are funding annartist who received a grant from PerformancenArt last year, and the ProfessionalnTheater Presenters category ofnthe Theater program certainly knowsnthat an NEA-funded theater series includesnshows by artists who have re­nnnceived individual grants. There is nothingnunintentional or against the rules orn”mistaken” about it.nWhat is most disturbing about allnthis is not the four Rejecteds’ artisticnpretensions or greediness; it’s that nobodynat the NEA seems to think therenis anything wrong with double-dipping,nor jumping from program tonprogram to keep somebody funded, ornwith getting around the fellowship limitsnby finding an organization that willndo the publicly funded equivalent ofnmoney-laundering.n— Katherine DaltonnFREEDOM OF RELIGION isnimportant to Americans. So is freedomnof expression. Both freedoms are traditionallynguaranteed by the FirstnAmendment, which prohibits governmentninterference in religious freedomneither by establishing a religion or bynforbidding religious exercises. Whatnwas not envisaged was that the “freenexpression” provisions of the samenamendment — from which the freedomsnof speech and of the press arenderived — could be used to “establish”ngovernment attacks on religion. Yet asnthe Serrano and Mapplethorpe controversiesnunfolded, it became clear thatngovernment will not only prohibitnmany innocent-seeming activities thatnit judges favorable to a religion, but itnwill endorse and fund activities that arenopenly hostile to religion and religiousnvalues.nLast August 29, attorneys of thenRutherford Institute of Charlottesville,nVirginia, filed a federal lawsuit in thenU.S. District Court in Washington,nD.C., against the National Endowmentnfor the Arts and its harried chairman,nJohn Frohnmayer, accusing themnof taking a position of “open andnnotorious hostility towards religion.”nThus Rutherford has made explicit, innlegal language, what millions of usnhave sensed.nSpecifically targeted was a grantnof fifteen thousand dollars by thenNEA for the creation and exhibitionnof a catalogue produced by DavidnWojnarowicz of New York entitlednTongues of Flame. According to thenRutherford attorneys, “the government-fundedncatalogue includes annimage depicting Jesus Christ as annintravenous drug user and refers tonDECEMBER 1990/7n