The National Endowment for the Arts rejected a $42,000 grant proposal from the Maine College of Art in Portland for an exhibit by performance artist William Pope.L, titled "Pope.L: eRacism." In an earlier performance, the artist walked around New York City with a 14-foot white cardboard penis, calling it a commentary on "the supremacy of white phalluses." Two years prior, the artist won a grant for an exhibition in which, the New York Times reports, "he spent several days eating and regurgitating copies of The Wall Street Journal."

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