“Finding Home” is a collaborative piece between Springfield Tenants Unite and Liberated Creatives Owner Keisha McMillen who came up with the documentary concept.
McMillen said she was “always involved in the arts” but that her career began shortly after she received after graduating from Drury University in 2018. Since then, McMillen has worked for a variety of nonprofit groups in the area, including the Springfield-Greene County Park Board, the Boys and Girls Club, the Andy Williams Moon River Theatre, Plotline Film the Springfield Arts Council.
Now, McMillen operates Liberated Creatives, an organization that she described as “a platform to inspire other people to express [and] heal themselves through the arts and to find community.”
She added that the organization was founded after she experienced several big life changes, which inspired her to help other people who may be going through similar issues.
McMillen’s story with Springfield Tenants Unite and “Finding Home” traces back to her time at the Arts Council where she met STUN Board President Rex Ybañez while collaborating on "Show Your Colors," an exhibition highlighting local artists of color.
In a statement, Ybañez said that when Keisha asked if STUN was willing to work on a project related to housing, they “couldn’t refuse.”
“Working with Keisha again in a poignant yet powerful way that centers (on) housing has been a fulfilling process,” they added. “We cannot wait to share this project with the community.”
Springfield Tenants Unite is a city-wide tenant union that organizes to “ensure that everyone in Springfield has access to safe, accessible, and truly affordable homes,” according to their website.
While both STUN and McMillen are involved in the production of the documentary, McMillen said she was the one who originally came up with the concept.
“The documentary was actually a project idea that I had for myself. I decided to do a little short film but then realized that this was going to be a lot more work to meet my ambitious expectations, so I needed to find people who would help with that.”
“Since this had to do with homelessness and housing instability, I wanted to give back to the community somehow, so I reached out to Springfield Tenants Unite.”
“[STUN had] a bunch of artists who have experience with film work, [so they] put a committee together [with] all the people and marketing and different things that you need to put [a] project together.”
McMillen said that she helped to form the creative team, is its executive producer and is overseeing all of the marketing and editing for the film.
Besides the documentary, the group plans to create a community zine workshop and to host an art installation entitled “A Child’s Room.”
The installation is created by STUN and the group and centers around a child’s bedroom.
McMillen said that she hopes the workshop and installation will allow people to share their experiences with housing as a whole and to reflect on their housing experiences as both a child and an adult.
McMillen also added that through her collaboration with STUN, she plans to provide the finished documentary to them as a “call for action” and to help them “solidify different programming through a creative lens.”
McMillen said that all donations from the project will be given to STUN to support their efforts.
While there are yet to be set dates for the event, McMillen said that the documentary is in post-production and that the team hopes to release it in July 2026.
She added that the group already has contracts with the Moxie, the Ozarks Film Foundry and Story House Bookstore to host events and screenings. She also said that there are plans to make contracts with other local venues in Springfield as well as in other Missouri cities such as Kansas City, St. Louis, Columbia and Joplin.
Updates on the documentary and event will be found on social media. Both organizations are on Instagram and Facebook and have websites.