Cultural institutions returning to live, in-person performance after the enforced hiatus of the pandemic are confronting questions that go beyond when, how, and if they will return to business as usual. An unprecedented infusion of government funds, intended to ameliorate some of the financial damage wreaked by the pandemic, has put a new spotlight on the obligations of such institutions to serve as true community resources. At the same time, the national reckoning over racial justice set off by the murder of George Floyd in 2020 has intensified the need for arts institutions to consider their response and relevance to today’s issues. Public statements of support and allyship were a start but, as Torrie Allen, president and CEO of Arts Midwest noted during the OPERA America conference panel, “The Politics of Art,” “Performative gestures are meaningless” without actual work on change.