Take Action for International Artistic Exchange!

Courtesy of Americans for the Arts Action Center:

Federal: Tell Congress to Ease Restrictions on Foreign Artists and Cultural Exchanges
Help Insure Reasonable Rules for Visas and Cultural Exchange

There are currently two international issues affecting the arts community: prohibitive restrictions by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on foreign artists obtaining visas, and a lack of funding for the Cultural Programs Division of the State Department’s Office of Citizen Exchanges, resulting in difficulties in cultural exchanges.

At a time when international cultural exchange is of great value to United States interests, nonprofit arts organizations confront untenable delays, unreasonable fees, and other uncertainties in getting approval for visa petitions for foreign guest artists. Members of Congress should be urged to contact U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and urge immediate adoption of the several common sense administrative reforms that will ensure timely processing of nonprofit arts-related visa petitions.

To learn more about immigration issues and cultural exchange, read our international issues brief. You may also wish to read the speech that George F. Kennan delivered to the International Council of the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1956. Perhaps the most influential American diplomat of the post-war era and former U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union, Kennan’s thoughts on the importance of international exchange in the arts resonate now more than ever.

Take action now here, and thanks!