Unbroken

By Sasha Hohri, Leon Sun and Eddie Wong
from East Wind Winter/Spring 1985

We are now in the middle of the 1980's, and it is becoming increasingly cleat that Asian American artists are facing critical challenges, not just in the realm of survival but of growth as well.

Under Reaganism, most Asian American artists are having a hard time surviving. While we have to scratch and dig for a gig, exhibit space, publisher, etc., symphonies and museums sit fat and sassy as ever. What little private support there was for Asian American artists from the established art world has shrunk even further, and we end up competing and fighting with each other, instead of our common enemy. Reagan's takeover for the National Endowment of the Arts along with his master plan for economic recovery, means that now, working class and minority artists must turn directly to the 'private sector," which is often controlled by the ruling circles, for their daily bread.

With Reagan's re]election and the ruling class' move to the right, Asians, other Third World people, and working people are facing an ideological and social climate which is becoming increasingly hostile to progressive politics and culture.

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