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For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
November 30, 2001
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 Secretary's Speech 
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Address of the Secretary of the
US Department of Art & Technology
at the swearing-in ceremony
To the LINK artists reception at the
Maryland Institute College of Art
9:00 P.M. EST
This evening, Friday, November 30th, at 9:00 EST, the newly sworn-in Secretary
of the US Department of Art & Technology, Randall M. Packer, delivered
the following address:
THE SECRETARY: I am honored and humbled to stand here in this auditorium, where so many young artists have been inspired, only to enter a world unable to comprehend their work.
You see, the recognition of the artist is rare in history, and even more uncommon in our country. With a simple oath, we obliterate the past and create new beginnings. I am here to announce that tonight is the beginning of the 21st Century.
We have a place, all of us, in a story - a story we continue, but whose end we will never see. It is the story of the New World that became disconnected from the Old, a story of a society that became a servant to corporate interests, the story of a Superpower that went out into the world to franchise, globalize, homogenize and conquer with McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken.
It
is the American story - a story of flawed, corrupt, fallible people without
taste, who have lost touch with the grand and enduring ideals of its
true
cultural heroes.
The grandest of these ideals is an unfolding American promise: that the artist as visionary, as social revolutionary - driven by the desire to change the world - must have voice in the national dialogue; and must express his distaste for the status quo through ideas that become real social action.
And this is my solemn pledge: I will work to support artistic freedom, utopian idealism and an active role for the artist in reshaping public policy - particularly in these times of crisis - through nothing less than the Appropriation of the US Government.
And we
are confident in those principles of virtualization that unite and lead us
onward.
******
America's artists, at their best, are stubborn, subversive, cultural warriors.
We must be expansive in a time of great cultural poverty by destroying the old ways instead of passing them on to future generations.
To do this, together, we will reclaim America's Government, before ignorance and apathy claim our young artists.
And so we will encourage our museums to tear down their walls, lest the old models prevent artists from breaking convention.
And we will confront corporate control of mass media, so that a new century is spared new horrors of CNN.
And we will provide immunity from the extension of new technologies into the social sphere.
And we will support those artists who bear the scars of being on the wrong side of the digital divide.
The enemies of New Media should make no mistake: American Technology remains dominant in the world through its foundation of social consciousness, shaping new ways of thinking, freedom of association, and extreme states of cybernetically-induced, altered consciousness.
We will
defend our artists, our engineers, and their revolutionary ideas. We will
show purpose without arrogance. We will meet anachronism and old ways with
resolve and strength. And to all nations, we will speak for the enduring
values that gave birth to the Macintosh and its ideological confrontation
with Microsoft.
******
In all
these ways, I will bring the values of our history to our times. For as British
artist Wyndham Lewis articulated so well, "The artist is always engaged
in writing a detailed history of the future because he is the only person
aware of the nature of the present."
What we do is as important, if not more important, as anything Government does. I ask you to be active citizens: citizens, not spectators; citizens, not subjects; engaged citizens, evolving into a more telematically-connected, participatory society, through Collective Agency.
When the spirit of individuality is missing, no Government program can replace it. When this spirit is present, no corporation, no media mogul, no Government official, not even George W. Bush, can stand against it.
As we begin the 21st Century,: the US Department of Art & Technology is now poised to transform our art, our Government, and our culture through the dissolution of reality.
Never
tiring, never yielding, never finishing, we renew that purpose today, to
make our country more United, more Utopian, and more Outrageous, to affirm
the role of our artists and encourage them to transform Government Bureaucracy
as we know it.
This work continues. This story goes on as the Department of Art & Technology of the United States of America enables our artists to make that move from the ivory tower to the control tower of society.
God bless you all, and God bless Art & Technology
END 8:17 P.M. EST
Contact: Press Secretary of the US Department of Art & Technology press@usdept-arttech.net
# 01-092
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