Sure , it's known that the CIA gave money to the Ford Foundation who then gave donations to various literary magazines, art reviews, and visual arts enterprises

Sure , it's known that the CIA gave money to the Ford Foundation who then gave donations to various literary magazines, art reviews, and visual arts enterprises during the Cold War. It took decades for this to come out, although it was long suspected. "We" needed some bona fide art with an accompanying criticsl rationale to balance that of the Soviets. One can interpret the whole ethos of the New York School of the postwar years in this way. Heroic individuals like Jackson Pollack striking out and defining whole genres of art, total opposite of the dreary collective approach of the Soviets. This does not make the art invalid, suspect, or whatever. It should challenge us to look beyond the canonical figures, and to maintain an independent perspective on their work.