Cultural sustainability has been a buzz term in the arts and cultural world. If one treats an art institution like a common corporation that conducts financial statement analyses, and evaluates the productivity and ESG of the art institution, will the produced numbers convey the same meanings as the universal values outside the art field? What numbers can reflect the social responsibility of an art institution? Moreover, when there are things that the numbers fail to describe or reflect, are they the so-called cultural values? Can these non-evaluable values be re-examined somehow? Since artistic creation is supported by art institutions and taxpayers, is this the absolute guarantee of these values?

This project collaborates with credible financial and accounting professionals, and applies the logic and methods of financial statistics (instead of Social Return on Investment, or SROI) to conduct an analysis of the sustainable values and productivity of art institutions in Taiwan. Providing phasal results of the data analysis, the project explains the potential meanings of the numbers to further unearth and question about the connections between social values and cultural practice by looking at the phenomena reflected by the numbers.