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Summer 2026 Internships and Funding Awards

Now that Penn students have swept their dorms, dragged suitcases to the curb and waved goodbye to campus, many are preparing for a big milestone: summer internships. We are pleased to announce that nine students received internship support from Penn Live Arts through our Arts & Entertainment Career Connections program with internships offered in partnership with alumni employers or through funding awards made to those who had already secured opportunities.

This summer’s cohort of interns is our largest since the program began in 2022, and also the most academically diverse. Read more...

Toll the Bell: 2026

In the Philadelphia area, we hear near-constant news about gun violence. Our fellow citizens are injured or dying with all-too-frequent regularity in shootings near public schools, in workplaces and at gatherings meant for celebration. Though our home ranks among the top twenty cities nationally with the highest gun homicide rates, gun violence isn't exclusive to Philadelphia; within the United States, tens of thousands of people die of gun-related injuries every year.

Though these are troubling realities, there are real signs of hope. Read more...

Amplifying the Arts in America 250 Celebrations

Dance Penn Live Arts Commission World Premieres

Kathy Sachs, founder and chair of ArtPhilly, wanted to amplify the arts in the city’s semiquincentennial celebration this summer . As plans took shape for the organization’s inaugural What Now: 2026 Festival, Sachs turned to us at Penn Live Arts, where she sits on the Board of Advisors. Read more...

The Tricia and Jason Pantzer Family Box Office

We are thrilled to share that a $1 million gift will name the Tricia and Jason Pantzer Family Box Office at the Annenberg Center. The Pantzer family’s gift stands among the early leadership support of our capital campaign and reflects their strong belief in efforts to renovate and expand the facilities that support performance and cultural life on campus. Read more...

America Unfinished: Tommie-Waheed Evans

Dance Penn Live Arts Commission World Premieres

Tommie-Waheed Evans is a featured artist in our 25/26 season, America Unfinished, marking our country’s 250th anniversary. The choreographer’s latest work, in case of fire, speak—which we co-commissioned with ArtPhilly—responds to Martha Graham’s American Document (1938) and its essential question: “What is an American?”. Performed by the Martha Graham Dance Company with dancers from PHILADANCO!, the work premieres on our stage on May 29-30.

Ahead of the performance, we invited Evans to reflect and share his thoughts on the piece and this pivotal moment in our country’s legacy: Read more...

26/27 Season: Belonging

Belonging

What does it mean to belong? What do we carry with us, and what do we leave behind?

In our 26/27 season, Belonging, we explore how people navigate change and find acceptance in new worlds while longing for the community and traditions of home. Across great distances and generations, migration has formed our country as a living mosaic of cultures continually being remade, reimagined and passed on. We celebrate this vibrant and evolving tapestry through the lens of music, dance and theatre, revealing belonging not as a fixed place, but as something we must continually create together. Read more...

“What I Would Declare”: Conversations and Reflections at the Listening Cabinet

America Unfinished

Last year, as we launched America Unfinished, our 25/26 season marking America’s semiquincentennial, I searched for a way to engage audiences with questions of independence, interdependence, democracy and America’s future. Artists as diverse as Mark Morris, Johnny Gandelsman and Ephrat Asherie would approach the question of what it means to be American at this moment – how could audiences participate in that conversation? Read more...

America Unfinished: Delbert Anderson

America Unfinished Jazz Penn Live Arts Commission World Premieres

Delbert Anderson is a featured artist in our 25/26 season, America Unfinished, marking our country’s 250th anniversary. On April 26, Anderson and his quartet will perform the world premiere commissioned work Beyond Belief, a multi-part meditation on Navajo history and the tribe’s broken relationship with America. We invited Anderson to reflect and share his thoughts on his work and this pivotal moment in our country’s legacy: Read more...

The unparalleled Paul Taylor Dance Company returns with two masterpieces

Dance

“Each dance is a new beginning, a new place to discover”
Paul Taylor

With a 64-year career and 147 works, Paul Taylor (1930–2018) left an ineffable mark on American modern dance. His choreography, which reflects his deep roots as an artist, innovator and provocateur, is known for its overarching architectural structure, musicality and for tackling thorny issues. Read more...

The Final Year of a Powerful Residency

Accelerator Program Dance World Premieres

The world premiere of Losing My Religion marked the last commission in Rennie Harris’ three-year artist residency. As befits his deep roots in Philadelphia, the residency’s final season engaged people across the city, from older dancers who remember Harris’ first impromptu performances to youth just beginning to make connections between the work of professional artists and their own creative energies. Read more...