Arts organizations and non-profits have only held power in the artworld since the National Endowment for the Arts stopped issuing individual artists’ grants in the early 90s, as Robert Mapplethorpe’s images were confiscated and Jesse Helms railed against the likes of Andres Serrano and Karen Finley. Houston’s The Art Guys were some of the last artists in America to receive an NEA individual grant, in 1995. Since then all art funding has passed through local or genre organizations, fracturing the illusion of objectivity that the NEA provided, and doling out money to art ‘warlords’ capable of sustaining their own gangs and squeezing others.

Click to read more of Buffalo Sean's report from the Houston ArtCamp. It's interesting. He breaks down Houston the Houstonartworldscene real well.