Art from the Swamp

The federal government is the country's largest single patron of art, spending millions of taxpayer dollars on projects largely without public knowledge or involvement. This book exposes the programs and policies responsible for this glut of unsupervised bureaucratic spending, citing examples like an outlandish Eisenhower memorial and a $750,000 wood sculpture that sickened workers. Written by Bruce Cole, the longest-serving chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, it offers suggestions for reforming or eliminating these wasteful practices.