About POWarts
POWarts is a catalyst for connection and growth in the visual arts. We bring together female-identifying professionals to share knowledge, expand opportunities, and create a more dynamic and inclusive industry.
We’re building the kind of community that strengthens careers and shapes a culture rooted in agency, safety, and opportunity.
OUR MISSION:
We believe in coming together to connect over the things that matter: the good, the bad, and the ugly, and to reimagine how we work with and support one another. Because no matter where you are on your path, someone else has been there too.
We’re here for the real talk—about money, leadership, burnout, ambition, and everything in between—and we’re making space for those conversations. Connecting over shared experiences, we help each other navigate the challenges, celebrate the wins, and shape a future where we all thrive.
POWarts’ Core Values + Guiding Principles:
Equity: POWarts is wholeheartedly dedicated to the principles of inclusivity, equal job access, fair, living wages, and salary transparency for all working within the greater visual arts industry. We believe that all individuals deserve equitable treatment and opportunities in all areas of their professional lives, and the freedom and ability to advance their careers in a positive, proactive, healthy, and supported way.
Safety: POWarts is fundamentally committed to advocating for and maintaining a visual arts industry in which all workers experience physical, emotional, and financial safety.
Advocacy: Rooted in a dedication to providing artworkers the tools, knowledge, and support they need to credibly and productively advocate for themselves. More broadly, POWarts is focused on holding the visual arts industry accountable and is determined to facilitate and deliver industry-wide change that responds directly to the issues, concerns, blind spots, and biases that artworkers face. POWarts believes that in order to create lasting change, everyone must play a part in assuring safe, healthy environments, fair practices, workplace regulations, and equitable treatment.
Education and Transparency: POWarts provides its members with access to industry-specific information and data, and to professional development tools and resources. In fostering an open dialogue with shared resources, POWarts creates the conditions for understanding and collective empowerment.
Mobilization of the Next Generation: We are fully committed to nurturing and growing the next generation of workers in the visual arts industry. POWarts aims to build and maintain a community in which all members, at whatever point in their career arcs, can safely share their experiences, offer and receive support and assistance, and actively impact one another’s professional advancement and security.
Inclusivity and Mutual Respect: POWarts fosters communal engagement rooted in mutual respect. We nourish our networks to create diverse support systems, and to craft solutions that amplify others. We cultivate a culture of curiosity and empathy, and invite, include, and center a diverse mix of underrepresented voices, experiences, and points of view.
The Intersection of Creativity and Industry: The business of art requires the creative spark to exist, and cannot be fully expressed or brought forth to a wider audience without a fair, foundational set of systems supporting all the behind-the-scenes workers. Women in the visual arts community need the knowledge and tools to center themselves between these disparate but interlinked conditions, and to fruitfully advocate for their own education and advancement within a healthy industry, no matter which side of the equation they occupy.
