Making change is a process, and the PST ART community in this inaugural Climate Impact Program (CIP) put this process in motion with financial support from Getty and technical support from LHL Consulting. Integrating the CIP as an ongoing part of PST ART will create the conditions for a new, sustainable standard for exhibition making that is modeled by institutions in Southern California. Not only did the PST ART CIP change sustainability practices within participating partner venues, the program also demonstrated that collaborative climate action is possible, that the sector is engaged, and that the desire to continue this work is strong.
Accomplishments
Working together Getty, LHL, and the PST ART partners made progress towards each of the following CIP goals:
Increase the climate fluency of PST ART participants
More than 400 individuals involved with PST ART attended at least one educational event where they gained access to strategies, tools, and resources to support effective climate action for PST ART projects. Partners generated over 40 Climate Impact Reports (CIRs), and for 80% of those partner venues it was the first such report issued. Perhaps most importantly, the CIP leaves a lasting legacy of art workers across Southern California who have a familiarity with climate impact work related to exhibition-making, with over 140 individuals actively contributing to the CIRs for PST ART.
Improve climate impact of PST ART exhibitions
The PST ART Climate Impact Program initiated a ripple of climate action within project teams that continuously informed decision-making. While there wasn’t a prior benchmark of exhibition-making data for comparison, ample evidence shared by PST ART teams confirms that they implemented novel climate impact mitigation strategies through the CIP, such as reducing shipping and travel, finding alternatives to wall vinyl, and reducing—and in some cases completely eliminating—exhibition waste. Thanks to this report, there are now benchmarks for PST ART emissions, material source and destination decisions, and climate engagement.
Build a community for climate action
Working with the LHL consulting team, Getty created a trusted space for participants to share successes, challenges, and knowledge across their institutions. Beyond the CIP reporting requirements, PST ART participants shared details about their climate impact work during consultant office hours, educational webinars and other programming events, and an in-person Show & Tell event. As a result of the program, several institutions reported forming green teams both within their immediate team and across larger institutional departments. In addition, more than a dozen CIP participants that were leading sustainability work at their institutions formed the Climate Collective of Los Angeles Museums. The group convened regularly throughout PST ART and at the American Alliance of Museums conference in May 2025, with plans to continue regular meetings.
Create data-backed recommendations for climate action
The PST ART CIP has created one of the most comprehensive data sets to date on exhibition-making climate impact. In addition to extensive qualitative data from interviews, case studies, and narrative reporting, the program provided the first benchmarks for travel and shipping emissions, waste output, and engagement for PST ART. This qualitative and quantitative data will help guide continued action by Getty and the PST ART partners and can also be used across the sector to set new, data-backed targets.
Conditions for Success
There was no existing model for the PST ART Climate Impact Program, but participant reporting and feedback suggest several characteristics contributed to its success. First, Getty and LHL emphasized process over perfection. By acting as guides instead of experts, the LHL consulting team allowed projects the flexibility to adapt to a suggested framework as they saw fit rather than insisting on a rigid, one-size-fits-all approach. LHL often began partner conversations by emphasizing that no one could do everything and that whatever participants could do was enough, creating a safe space to learn from both successes and failures.
Second, community-based leadership was essential in gaining trust. One of the co-leads for the CIP is a local artist and co-curator for a PST ART project. This deepened the project consultancy’s understanding and empathy for the PST ART community’s shared activities, challenges, and priorities.
Lastly, centralized funder support was an effective strategy to amplify climate action and community-building. Through project reporting and meetings with the LHL consulting team, PST ART partners affirmed that Getty’s full support of the CIP gave teams the necessary permission to take action. Getty’s backing provided leverage to prioritize climate work to leadership; write sustainability clauses into contracts; have climate action conversations with artists and vendors; and make space to think critically about the need to change the status quo.
The large-scale collaboration that defines PST ART offered a built-in community network among grantees, created a cohesive approach to reporting, and gave program participants the sense that their actions were contributing to something bigger than just their own project. While PST ART is somewhat unique in its structure, other grantmaking foundations that fund multiple projects as well as other multi-partner art events such as biennials have a similar opportunity to leverage support for climate action with an expansive community impact.
Looking Ahead
It is clear that arts professionals want to engage in climate action work, but they can be limited by capacity and structural support. Less than a quarter of PST ART partners opted out of the CIP, and the main reason given for non-participation was lack of staff capacity/availability. Financial support is one way to address this challenge, and Getty is committed to continued support for climate action through PST ART and other initiatives, from the Getty Global Art and Sustainability Fellowship Program to the Managing Collection Environments Initiative led by the Getty Conservation Institute.
It is equally clear that climate impact work is a collective endeavor. The relationships developed both within project teams and between PST ART partner venues through the CIP promise to shape climate action in Southern California’s cultural institutions in profound and lasting ways. Getty and its collaborators have also laid the groundwork through PST ART for the cultural sector to be a meaningful contributor to the regionwide climate conversations by inviting the participation of artists, audiences, vendors, and broader circles of community stakeholders.
2030 is an important year for climate action advocacy. It is also when PST ART will return to Southern California. PST ART: Art & Science Collide provided critical climate impact data and benchmarks through the inaugural Climate Impact Program, while simultaneously highlighting community generated solutions for sustainable exhibition making across institutions of varying type and size. Going forward, the cultural sector is well-positioned to contribute to climate solutions within and beyond our own doors, and Getty will continue to support this work with its PST ART partners into the future.