[4] The aPA has acquired and commissioned works by many notable sculptors, including Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Alexander Stirling Calder, Daniel Chester French, Frederic Remington, Paul Manship, and Albert Laessle,[5] supported city planning projects, established an outdoor sculpture conservation program, and sponsored numerous publications, exhibitions, and educational programs.

The Association initially focused on enhancing Fairmount Park with outdoor sculpture, but the organization's mission expanded in 1906 to include the rest of the city as a whole: to "promote and foster the beautiful in Philadelphia, in its architecture, improvements, and the city plan.

[5] The association's first official venture was purchasing Hudson Bay Wolves Quarreling Over the Carcass of a Deer (1872) by Edward Kemeys,[11] and its first major undertaking was commissioning Alexander Milne Calder for an equestrian statue of Major General George Meade in 1873.

The change was made to more clearly communicate the nature and scope of the organization's work, and to distinguish itself from other local and national public art agencies.

[13] The organization's first major project under its new name was Open Air (2012), a world-premiere interactive light installation for the Benjamin Franklin Parkway by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer.