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National Endowment For The Arts Chairman Tours Rochester Cultural Attractions

Jane Chu, Rep. Louise Slaughter & Eastman Dean Jamal Rossi
Randy Gorbman
/
WXXI News
Jane Chu, Rep. Louise Slaughter & Eastman Dean Jamal Rossi

The Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts made a quick tour through Rochester Tuesday and she came away impressed with what she saw and heard.

Jane Chu toured places such as Geva Theatre, Garth Fagan Dance, the George Eastman Museum and the Eastman School of Music.

During a visit to the Eastman School Chu got to listen to students performing one of the works recently created as part of a project called Music in the American Wild, which involves Eastman musicians performing new compositions in a dozen national parks and historic sites around the country.

That project was funded in part by an NEA grant, and Chu noted that it’s connections like this, between the arts and other venues and activities, that helps broaden the impact art and music can have.

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“We recognize the arts certainly on a stage or in a museum but what about in a health care setting, or what about in a science lab. We’ve found at the National Endowment for the Arts that within every discipline and field of study, the arts are spurring innovation and creating opportunities.”

Both Chu, and Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, who brought Chu to Rochester, talked about the success that literature, music and the arts have had in helping military veterans cope with various physical and psychological issues.

Slaughter says funding for the NEA is an investment that more than pays for itself not only in terms of the impact that the arts have on the economy, but in the important cultural experience it brings to education.

“We should never have a school that does away with its arts program. We should certainly never have students who don’t have access to it, to music, to art, to literature. It is one of the best things that we can give them as children and it’s one of the things that they will enjoy all their lives.”

Over the last three years, the NEA has provided more than $720,000 in funding to Rochester institutions.

Randy Gorbman is WXXI's director of news and public affairs. Randy manages the day-to-day operations of WXXI News on radio, television, and online.