In the late 1990s, when the demand for professional arts management talent was surging across Europe and North America, Taiwan’s cultural and creative industries were also experiencing rapid growth and an awakening appreciation for cultural governance. Pioneering this emerging field, National Sun Yat-sen University established the Graduate Institute of Arts Management in 2001 and officially welcomed its inaugural cohort of students.

In response to institutional resource consolidation, the institute merged with the Department of Theatre Arts in the 2007 academic year, becoming the Master's Program in Arts Management under the Department of Theatre Arts, and was later designated as the Master's Program of the Department of Theatre Arts. Throughout these structural transitions, arts management remained the essential pillar of our academic identity. Students are comprehensively trained in production, marketing, and cultural administration—embracing the principle that artistic production is never merely the solitary realization of an artist, but a collective effort sustained by audience support, community engagement, public grants, and strategic fundraising. This ethos bridges theatre, music, dance, visual arts, and museums alike. Transcending the boundaries of elite art, we guide students to explore the diverse intersections of culture and everyday life: actively participating in community engagement and aesthetic education under our guiding philosophy, “Practice in Society, Create in the Community.”

Tracing our origins, the university has cultivated distinguished expertise in arts management for more than two decades. Despite organizational restructuring and renaming over the years, the program has continually sustained strong prominence across higher education and the creative sectors, with alumni achieving outstanding accomplishments in both academia and industry. Over these past twenty years, arts management has evolved from an emerging discipline into a mature, internationally recognized field essential to world-class universities. Amid the growing global and domestic demand for visionary cultural leadership, the Ministry of Education approved the re-establishment of the Graduate Institute of Arts Management and Entrepreneurship in the 2021 academic year, marking a vibrant new chapter in our mission.