When the chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, Rocco Landesman, visited Philedelphia recently, there was much of the usual talk about arts-as-economic engine. You’re familiar with it: ”talk of the arts as an economic engine, the arts as a tool of neighborhood revitalization, the arts as a key to tourism, the arts as linchpin of economic development.” In that article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Rachel Zimmerman of InLiquid calls the arts administrators out, wondering where the artists fit into this equation:

“It seems that culture and art are important as long as they redevelop neighborhoods or have some quantifiable measure,” Zimmerman said. “We’re continually losing sight of the value of what’s created, not just as a means of social or economic change, but as art. It becomes a Band-Aid to fix the ills of society and is not about the art or the artists anymore.”

Philadelphia is mighty familiar with the uneasy relationship between art administrator and art object. This Friday, the Angelika will open the film The Art of the Steal, which documents the conspiracy that ripped the Barnes Collection from its collector’s intended sanctuary and brought it to downtown Philly. The film is steeped in these questions of artistic economies. Look for a review of the film on FrontRow Thursday.