“Every year, USA awards grants of $50,000 each to 50 artists from eight disciplines, from architecture and writing to visual art. Since 2005, 350 artists have been the lucky (OK, meritorious) recipients of this largesse, in part thanks to a nearly threefold increase in the organization’s endowment in nine years, as well as the backing of some serious philanthropists such as the Ford Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation.”