Politics & Power Quote by David Selby

Selby’s line does something quietly strategic: it reframes arts funding as a practical tool, not a luxury item. By calling noncommercial projects “ventures,” he borrows the language of business to defend work that business logic would kill. That word choice is the tell. He’s trying to meet skeptics on their own turf, suggesting the arts aren’t some delicate hobby asking for charity; they’re risk-bearing experiments that simply don’t fit a profit-first marketplace.

The intent is defensive but not apologetic. Selby doesn’t romanticize artists or pretend the market is evil. He accepts commercial viability as a real filter, then points out its blind spot: the market rewards what’s legible and scalable, not necessarily what’s formally daring, culturally specific, or socially useful. The subtext is that “commercial” isn’t a synonym for “good,” it’s a synonym for “saleable.” Without public support, the cultural ecosystem narrows toward what can be pitched, branded, and recouped, leaving behind regional theater, documentaries, new composers, experimental dance, and the early-career work that later becomes canon.

Coming from an actor, the statement carries an industry insider’s realism. Performers know how many meaningful projects live on razor-thin margins, and how often the most artistically ambitious work is the least investor-friendly. In the broader political context, this is also a preemptive rebuttal to the perennial argument that the arts should “pay for themselves.” Selby’s reply: some of the work worth having can’t, and that’s precisely why a democracy funds it anyway.