About
The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation is an independent Center at the University of Pennsylvania, established in 2017 to advance the arts at Penn. We do this through our grantmaking, exhibitions and programming, and community initiatives.
Mission
The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation supports artistic production and creative practice through grantmaking, exhibitions and programming, and community initiatives, with a focus on the University of Pennsylvania and adjacent communities of West Philadelphia.
Our grantmaking provides essential catalytic support to get ideas off the ground, to encourage experimentation, and to cultivate meaningful engagement with and through the arts. The Sachs Program funds across disciplines, encouraging artistic and intellectual exchange, multi-modal practices, as well as deep investments in particular fields or areas of study.
Through our exhibitions and programming series we present a range of projects – new commissions, curated exhibitions, public talks, workshops, performances, and film screenings – reflective of the diversity of practices, ideas, and communities we cultivate, and making the arts at Penn more visible and accessible to the general public.
Through our community initiatives, such as the West Philadelphia Arts Initiative, we support a creative, culturally diverse, and pluralistic community. Our vision is to ensure that the arts are valued and embraced as a creative catalyst, driving innovation, inspiration, and action.
Staff and Board
The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation is directed by John McInerney, with staffed support by Chloe Reison and Elizabeth Shaw. The Sachs Program operates independently under the University of Pennsylvania Vice Provost for the Arts. It receives counsel and guidance from an advisory board of standing faculty and select arts leaders at Penn.
Sachs Program Staff
- John McInerney, Executive Director
- Chloe Reison, Associate Director
- Elizabeth Shaw, Administrative Assistant
Sachs Program Advisory Board
- Josephine Park, Co-chair
Associate Dean for Arts and Letters
President’s Distinguished Professor of English - Matt Neff, Co-chair
Director of Undergraduate Fine Arts and Design - Al Filreis
Kelly Family Professor of English
Director, Center for Programs in Contemporary Writing
Faculty Director, Kelly Writers House - Christopher A. Gruits
Executive & Artistic Director, Penn Live Arts - Deborah A. Thomas
R. Jean Brownlee Term Professor of Anthropology - Heather Love
Professor of English
Co-Director of Theatre Arts - Jasmine Elizabeth Johnson
Assistant Professor of Africana Studies - Johanna Burton
Daniel W. Dietrich II, Director, Institute of Contemporary Art - Michelle Lopez
Associate Professor of Fine Arts - Sharon Hayes
Professor of Fine Arts - Sonal Khullar
W. Norman Brown Associate Professor of South Asian Studies
Keith and Katherine Sachs
The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation is supported by an endowed gift from Keith L. and Katherine Sachs. Keith L. and Katherine Sachs have provided major support for the arts at Penn for more than a decade, completely transforming the landscape of arts education on campus.
This transformative gift – the largest gift ever made across the arts at Penn – will establish The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation and closely link arts education to the Penn Compact 2020’s goal of advancing innovation across the University.
Past gifts by Keith L. and Katherine Sachs have supported the Sachs Guest Curator Program at the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Sachs Professorship in Contemporary Art in the Department of History of Art in the School of Arts & Sciences, and the Fine Arts Program Fund and Visiting Professorship in the Department of Fine Arts in the School of Design