“…while no government can call a great artist or scholar into existence, it is necessary and appropriate for the Federal Government to help create and sustain not only a climate encouraging freedom of thought, imagination, and inquiry but also the material conditions facilitating the release of this creative talent.”
—National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, September 29, 1965
Join me in person (RSVP) or online (register) for a free, public event
reflecting on the
60th anniversary of the National Endowment for the Arts
Monday, September 29, 2025
6:00 - 8:00 pm Eastern Time, reception following
American University, Katzen Arts Center
4400 Massachusetts Ave NW
Washington, DC 20016
Co-hosted by Americans for the Arts, American University’s Arts Management Program,
and the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies
On September 29, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed a law to establish the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities. With his signature, Johnson was continuing and honoring the legacy of President John F. Kennedy, who had championed national awareness and pride in artistic achievement prior to his assassination in 1963. Johnson was also building out his own vision of “The Great Society,” where the federal government would play an active role in addressing economic inequality, education and healthcare, and civil rights.
Johnson didn’t originate many of the ideas and institutions that emerged from his presidency. But he did, without doubt, make them real. As Philip Kennicott wrote in The Washington Post (2014):
…in the extraordinarily active 89th Congress, which began in 1965, Johnson did something unprecedented in American history: He put art, culture and beauty on the same footing as roads, rights, commerce and security.
Kennicott went on to describe the many new federal arts initiatives (which also included the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the American Film Institute, the Hirshhorn and Renwick museums at the Smithsonian) as a new kind of national infrastructure:
The NEA, the NEH, the networks that bring us “Sesame Street” and “All Things Considered” were essentially a vast transportation bill meant to convey Americans through a moral, intellectual and aesthetic landscape.
Today, so many of the conventions and commitments of The Great Society – including the National Endowment for the Arts – are suddenly being revised or revoked.
Monday, September 29, 2025, marks 60 years to the day of the National Foundation on the Arts and Humanities Act. To mark the anniversary, the Arts Management Program at American University, in collaboration with Americans for the Arts and the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies, will host a public forum.
Please join us in person in the Katzen Arts Center at American University (RSVP) or online (register) to reflect on the past, present, and future of this grand experiment in federal arts support.
Sources
Kennicott, Philip. 2014. “The Great Society at 50: Lyndon B. Johnson’s Cultural Vision Mirrored His Domestic One.” Style. Washington Post, May 20.
Public Law 89-209. National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965. 89th Cong., 1st sess. September 29, 1965.