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PA CultureCheck 2025

PA CultureCheck 2025 is a statewide report that shines a light on the pandemic recovery progress and community engagement efforts of cultural, arts, and humanities organizations, released by the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance in partnership with PA Humanities and the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council. The report reveals the cultural sector is regaining its footing following the pandemic, but now faces significant threats due to unanticipated federal funding cuts.

While data for PA CultureCheck 2025 was being collected, the Trump administration issued a series of executive orders aimed at defunding and dismantling the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and other federal agencies that support arts and culture. In response to the far-reaching impact of the executive orders, we moved swiftly to distribute a supplemental survey to assess the threat that this might pose to Pennsylvania’s cultural sector, and those results are included in PA CultureCheck.

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Southeastern Pennsylvania Data Highlights:

  • Nearly all (92%) of Southeastern PA organizations surveyed report that cuts or changes to funding would impact them. These effects include potential impacts to cash flow and payroll, postponing or cancelling programs, and impacts to capital programs.
  • Half (50%) of all arts and culture organizations report attendance back to or above pre-pandemic (2019) levels.
  • The number of Performing Arts organizations whose attendance has returned to pre-pandemic levels has increased to 41%. This marks a 26% rise from last year’s survey, in which only 15% of Performing Arts organizations reported a return to pre-pandemic attendance numbers.
  • 95% of cultural organizations now partner with community organizations or institutions to deliver programs, an 8% increase since 2022.
  • Only 32% of organizations report increased revenue from 2022.

 

Funding for PA CultureCheck has been provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Additional support was provided through a grant from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Community and Economic Development (DCED). The full report is available at pahumanities.org/paculturecheck.