About Us

POBA is Where The Arts Live!

POBA is a groundbreaking online arts hub that celebrates and features the works of a range of exceptional artists who have died without recognition of the full measure of their talents or creative legacies.

Keeping Creative Legacies Alive

POBA was founded to showcase, promote, and preserve creative legacies through compelling displays and interesting human stories about these art makers. Individuals who become Presenter Members create displays for an artist they represent on a DIY basis using our comprehensive FAQs.

Under-recognized means that these artists are not national or household names for the art forms displayed on our site, but some  have received recognition in their local communities or regions for their work. Our artists range from highly trained to self-taught, and some pursued art as a hobby or second career. We think you will find their stories as engaging as their creative works.

Help For Heirs and Estate Executors

POBA can assist working artists and their families, agents, and representatives with information on managing their own works through POBA Tips, and a YouTube channel.

POBA History

POBA is a program of the James Kirk Bernard Foundation, a foundation created to honor the memory and interests of Jamie Bernard, a young writer and artist (1987-2010). Memorializing and sharing Jamie’s artistic passion and talent in a creative legacy served as inspiration for POBA, Where the Arts Live, and the mission to recognize and support the legacies of other talented deceased artists across a range of genres and media.

The James Kirk Bernard Foundation founders believe in the power of the arts to connect and to heal – physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally. POBA preserves and shares the creations and contributions of these artists, and encourages art appreciation and art making for everyone.

What’s a POBA?

POBA is the pronounced form of phowa, a Tibetan term that describes the transformation of consciousness at the time of death to begin a new life. This word captures the essence of POBA, Where the Arts Live, as the enduring and transcendent power of the arts to outlive our human forms, and creative works to transform the experience and consciousness of those with whom they connect. At POBA, art lives.