First family of arts lovers

Barack and Michelle Obama and their daughters spent the evening of Feb. 6 in the presidential box at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., applauding the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Evidently, it was the first family’s idea of a fun Friday night out.

But in a capital where every presidential inflection and turn of phrase is parsed for glimmers of meaning, that front-and-center display of enthusiasm for one of the “high” or “classic” arts boomed like a 21-gun salute. It fed increasing hopes among arts advocates that the Obamas would generate a greater buzz for the arts simply by smiling in theater seats or strolling through museum galleries.

If outings to arts venues become a habit with the first family, “it would be a huge boon to the arts community in Washington and for the United States and the world,” says David Andrew Snider, president of the League of Washington Theatres. “There’s a widespread feeling that he ‘gets it.’ He gets the importance of the arts.”

“They could indeed lead by example,” agrees Mariana Nork, senior vice president of the Corcoran Gallery of Art, across the street from the White House. “We’re going to have new trends set.”

At the Ailey company, Executive Director Sharon Gersten Luckman says colleagues quickly congratulated the dance troupe for having won the presidential seal of approval. “Everyone is commenting, at least in our world, that their first night out, their date night, was an arts event,” she says. “People are more thrilled than jealous.”

Other early signs that the arts may get to share the Obamas’ spotlight were opera star Renée Fleming’s inclusion in a free pre-inaugural concert at the Lincoln Memorial and the rainbow quartet featuring cellist Yo-Yo Ma and violinist Itzhak Perlman that shivered on the Capitol steps while delivering (via a recording, as it turned out) a musical prelude to the oath of office.