According to the United Nations:

“We stand firm in our commitment to protect and promote the right to freedom of expression, including artistic and creative expression. In addition to being an integral part of the protected human right to freedom of expression, artistic and creative expression is critical to the human spirit, the development of vibrant cultures, and the functioning of democratic societies. Artistic expression connects us all, transcending borders and barriers”.  ~ This quote has come from a joint statement made by 57 State Members at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva and delivered by Ambassador Janis Karklins, the Permanent Representative of Latvia to the United Nations on September 18, 2015

Dear Community - This page, like our lives and our our museum, is a work in progress. Changing and growing as we change and grow. Have suggestions or questions? support@musea.org

At Musea we are passionate about women in the arts having their stories and art shared. Many hands, many lands, many voices. We believe that women's voices and images are what is needed to create equality and justice in the systems for humanity. In all areas of Civil Rights women and people of color are the least represented voices at the table. Those who do speak up often do so at their own expense, finding themselves threatened, denounced and often at the impact of violence.

While no one can guarantee a truly safe space, at Musea we hope to be a space of invitation for a diversity of women's voices. Women's voices are often the ones speaking not just on their own behalf, but on behalf of all civil rights. Which include but are not limited to protection of fairness in law, protection from discrimination based on race, gender, religion or sexual orienation, individual freedom of speech and self expression, freedom of the press and political choice. This exctends into areas like fair wages, access to education, fair representation in the news, and in our focus area, access to arts and representation in the arts. When basic civil rights are not upheld, then access and prioritization to the basics of food, water, shelter and housing that are part of human rights are not upheld.

OUR VISION for EQUALITY

Our Vision is seen through the chosen framework of our community of creatives who are at cause for intentionally creating a future with access to justice, freedom and self expression.

The Matriarchal roots of Intentional Creativity have long been a stand for transforming systems of oppression of all forms. With revolutionary women creatives who were the Foremothers of this work, we learn the value of a woman's right to speak her truth, and to be as safe as possible to share her story and images. We have long been devoted to naming and transforming false, power-over frameworks that create oppression and disconnection through the teachings of Intentional Creativity.

At the heart of our community of Creatives, is an invitation to belonging. This belonging extends to all women of color from all traditions and cultures who feel called to Intentional Creativity as a path of access to self expression. WOMEN artists and their stories and creations are our primary focus. We recognize the ways in which oppressive systems impact our ability as women to bring our work forward. Women - and particularly women of color - have largely been excluded and edited from the art market and marketplace, even though there are as many women artists as there are men. For more information on gender inequity in the arts, click here to visit the National Museum of Women in the Arts Facts page.

A Call for CONSCIOUSNESS is a CALL for INCLUSION

We hold an ideal, based on experience that access to self expression, education and a supportive community empowers the possibility of becoming conscious and coherent. Conscious beings, by in large, naturally desire equality on all levels. Moving beyond belief and bias and into the framework of human rights, civil rights and the right to be self expressed.

We believe, and indeed have experienced, that when someone becomes more conscious, they begin to care about themselves in such a way that caring for others is integral to their own well being.

We understand that there are systems in place which distort our relationship with ourselves, one another and earth. These systems can keep us from seeing who we are and how change is possible.

Intentional Creativity provides a supportive pathway for deeper access to consciousness which catalyzes individuals to identify how these systems of oppression impact us both internally and externally and how we may be complicit with them. From this place, we are more able to step into anti-oppression work and integrate it in our lives and communities.

When women become conscious, they naturally desire to include, care and practice compassion. While there is always work to do, the first level of waking up is accessible through intentional self expression.

We are a community of creatives, including educators, healers, activists and entrepreneurs that share an empowered vision for a future of equality, justice, joy and peace.

We envision and work towards a culture where self-expression is understood as a basic human right, that leads towards consciousness, connection and therefore informed collaboration.

We see the essential need for the cultivation and collaboration of a truly colorful diversity of voices to tell a story that ensures a future for all of our children.

With the shared desires for justice from many lands and many hands, we envision and work towards solutions, systems and societies woven together by mutual respect for one another.

We see and indeed it is our experience, that when we weave our uniquely-crafted threads together, the strongest and most sustainable possible fabric for all of life is woven.

We see life as a relationship with creation and approach how we live and what we make with Intentional Creativity.

We as Creatives feel a call to shape, craft and design wholistic images, narratives and emergent frameworks that honor one another and the earth.

We see ourselves as citizens with an initiative to cause and create communities, conversations and creative pathways for ourselves and our human family.

We seek empowerment through inquiry, imagination and informed action so that we may heal ourselves and be well enough to engage in collective healing.

We see our responsibility to do our own work within our unique spiritual paths, artistic mediums, philosophies, cultures, ancestral wisdom and lineages, while coming together in a shared vision for justice informed by love.

We stand for the awakening of the collective of humanity so that together the story of justice we seek will become our reality.

Together we are crafting a culture where compassion and care are a quantum practice within our community and where feminine leadership is amplified in its ability to define new and emergent power-with frameworks leading the way to a more beautiful world.

Our body of work at Musea has crafted a culture of connection for over 100 years. In the past 20 years this connection has reached tens of thousands.

Uplifting the work of women artists who are activists and voices for justice and liberty is part of our vision. Shilo Shiv's message "I Wear My Body without Shame" is one we can hope and work towards for all women.

To watch our Founder's Interview with Shiloh Shiv and other Artists and Activists, go here

"Women's work and lives are often invisible masterpieces. We seek to bring our masterpieces to the center of the table, the wall, the courts, the museums and all the places women's voices have been missing. We will achieve this and indeed we are through lifting up women's voices and work, creating a platform for her to speak and share." ~ Shiloh Sophia

We acknowledge that the VISION we share is only a dream unless it is actionable in our lives, relationships and communities. In order to work together towards the justice and human rights we seek, we begin by seeing the masterpiece. Then we begin, to paint ourselves into the picture.

We seek understanding from doing our work individually and collectively that the “power-with” ideals we hold true within our own hearts aren’t often what is experienced in the “power-over” systems and establishments.

We who are able and ready, are called towards recovery and reparation on behalf of those who are most oppressed by covert and overt structures.

We seek to identify and dismantle false structures within ourselves and our community that place one life above another in any capacity.

We see the power within our community to work toward mending racialized trauma through education, lifting up the voice of women of color, and inviting white-bodied women into integral allyship.

We are devoted to lifting up the voices and images of women who have endured the experience of invisibility and injustice for likely over 7,000 years.