Art and politics have long been bad bedfellows. Politicians have converted art into propaganda and artists have welcomed alienation from bureaucratic societies. It very well may be that the modern nation is inimical to art, knowing at best how to “tolerate” it and at worst how to “suppress” it. In which case, my discussion is ended. But if art and politics are not oil and water; if, indeed, perception is basic to “social action,” we may develop a rapport whose possibilities should make both artist and politician stop and think.