Shiva was born in 1975 |Tehran, the capital of Iran, from a multi-cultural family. She grew up celebrating both Persian and Jewish culture. In September 1980, when she was 5 years old, Iran and Iraq engaged in a brutal war that lasted eight years and left over 5 million people killed. Her dad worked in the Air Force, while her mom was a PE teacher at a girl’s high school.

Shiva started to draw as young as 6 years old, mostly in bomb-shelters, as her dad was on duty in the front lines of the war and her family constantly moved from city to city because of her dad’s air force military duty. Shiva’s childhood memories in Iran are full of traumatic and painful scenes of war, government massacres, cultural, religious, and domestic massacres; as well as unhumanitarian laws against women and children under the Islamic Republic regime of Iran. At age 12, she started having severe PTSD and depression, however there were no places to seek help. During her college years in Iran, she was suspended from the University of Tehran, due to her nude drawings, and being a voice for women’s rights and her dissident mindset. She was arrested for purchasing an uncensored book (History of Impressionism) on the black market in Tehran.

Shiva eventually escaped from Iran through Syria, landing eventually in the USA.

She worked in various financial institutions between 1999- 2005. She shifted her career to Real Estate, staging and space design. She graduated from DVC in 2007 and became a mom in 2008. Inspired by her son and many new parents to pursue her art more seriously, Shiva went back to the California College of Art for her major on Illustration postgraduate degree.

Her path to healing traumas and motherhood led her to the writing of her memoirs, along with several children’s books. Shiva’s art portrays her appreciation of human anatomy in motion, female sensuality, pain, sorrow, unity, motherhood, kids, and the reflection of intense love through relationships. Shiva is a strong human right activist, a single mom and an advocate of children of the world.

Shiva J. established Art by Shiva LLC. in 2019. Her goal is to show and sell art for the benefit of kids around the world and promote art therapy as the best way to cope with PTSD and kids’ trauma who have emotional difficulties.