The need we have for information is great, and we get it from many admirable sources. The need we have for understanding and acceptance is much greater. The arts are uniquely able to help us meet the greater needs.

The arts capture our insecurities, quicken our instincts, guide us through threats. They help us know ourselves. They help us know each other. They help us know better.

However dark, however demanding the realities of existence are, artists provide the lift, the light, the ways to make it through. They help us find the joys and delights, the hopes we need for our days and hours. I am grateful for their gifts.

I'm hoping someday that we'll be able to start a consortium with places like Carnegie Hall to work on early childhood education. I really feel that's the most important place to put the arts.

In my own life, I share my home with works by artists like Elizabeth Murray, Martin Puryear, Jackie Windsor and so many others, whose creativity is clear and fresh and compelling; the works break through the usual, and they inspire creativity; they inspire responses and understanding.

Art shouldn't be prohibited in public schools when kids in private schools always get it.