California · Nonprofit
PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION
PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION (California) receives grants from 35 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,047,760 to it, the largest being Silicon Valley Community Foundation ($414,840). 24 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 51% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $1.4M
- Funders on record
- 35
- Grants received
- $3.0M
- Net assets
- $1.7M
What Palo Alto Art Center Foundation does
Mission
The mission of the Palo Alto Art Center Foundation is to expand the reach and impact of the palo alto art center through fundraising and advocacy
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Direct support of the palo alto art center: the paacf achieves its primary mission by directly supporting the programs and goals of the palo alto art center. This direct support covers five program areas: children's fine art, adult studio classes, exhibitions, project look! (an inquiry based museum education program for school children from throughout the region), and the art center's volunteer program
$355,370 spent$11,758 earned by the program63% of program spendingEvents, including great glass pumpkin patch, a collaboration with the bay area glass institute, is a unique program that serves glass artists from throughout the region. A four-day exhibition of thousands of glass pumpkins serves as the basis for project look! Tours for local school children, and a two-day sale generates substantial revenue for the artists involved and increased visibility of the art center
$20,191 spent$57,874 earned by the program4% of program spending1. Cultural kaleidoscope is an arts education program that pairs artists with k-5 classrooms in palo alto unified school district and east palo alto's ravenswood school district. There are ten residencies each year, each of which pairs a visual artist with a classroom from each district, thereby encouraging collaborative art making between students from two neighboring communities that have significant disparities in cultural and economic makeup. The program culminates in a public exhibition of student artwork at the palo alto art center. 2. The studio sale serves a unique and highly distinguished group of artists working in a range of disciplines, including jewelry design, ceramics and textiles.
$103,344 spent$58,922 earned by the program18% of program spendingArt travel program; education trips to view exhibitions, studios, and creative communities
$83,845 spent$188,815 earned by the program15% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $562,750.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2022 to 2023, from $1.3M to $1.6M (+25%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2025 2%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
71% of PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (63% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 10 funders to 16 funders, grant income rose $307k → $392k.
12 of 35 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 51% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 35 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 14% of grant income, and it takes 5 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 5 funders to its left
59% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 33% · 2018 20% · 2019 42% · 2020 30% · 2021 27% · 2022 27% · 2023 30% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
46% of PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 69% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
51% of PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $1.5M that is directly attributable, 90% of it comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.6M arriving through sponsors registered in 8 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 3,430 arts & culture nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,430 arts & culture nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $766k on record.
- Institute of Museum and Library Services$666k
- National Endowment for the Arts$100k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
47% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
96%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION?
- PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION (California) receives grants from 35 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,047,760 to it, the largest being Silicon Valley Community Foundation ($414,840). 24 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 51% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION have?
- IRS filings report 35 organizations giving $3,047,760 in grants to PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION, 24 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION?
- Silicon Valley Community Foundation is the largest funder on record, with $414,840 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like PALO ALTO ART CENTER FOUNDATION find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Palo Alto Art Center →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 35 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing