The City Arts Data Exchange
The City Arts Data Exchange is a joint initiative of SMU DataArts and Bloomberg Associates that brings together a growing group of local arts agencies to align data collection efforts towards shared learning. While no single set of metrics can fully capture the breadth of cultural activity in a city, shared data practices surface patterns across cities and enable benchmarking, informing policy, strategy, and advocacy.
Participating cities gain access to:
- a shared set of metrics for grant applicants
- opportunities to learn alongside peer agencies
- reporting and research that translates local data into practical insight
In return, participating cities contribute data to research benefiting the entire sector. If your local arts agency is interested in learning more, please contact our team.
A Growing National Collaborative
The initiative launched in 2025 with an initial cohort of 10 cities that shared grant applicant data they were already collecting, which led to the publication of City Arts Sector Trends: Divergence and Resilience Across Ten U.S. Cities (2019-2024). In 2026, a second cohort of 10 additional cities was convened who were all interested in building capacity for data collection. This second cohort of cities co-created a core set of metrics, agreed to collect that data in the future, and will share it back with the network. SMU DataArts is now recruiting a third cohort to begin data collection using these shared metrics in 2026 or 2027.
