The Medea Project: Theatre for Incarcerated Women is produced by Rhodessa Jones Productions. The Medea Project develops original productions that demonstrate their vision of "Arts as Social Activism". 

In 1989, on the basis of material developed while conducting classes at the San Francisco County Jail, Rhodessa Jones created "Big Butt Girls, Hard Headed Women", a performance piece based on the lives of the incarcerated women she encountered. During the work's creation, Jones and jail officials were made aware of issues that were specific to female inmates, such as guilt, depression, and self-loathing, which arose in response to feelings of failure in the face of community. These issues directly contribute to recidivism among female offenders.

Based on this observation, Jones founded The Medea Project: Theatre for Incarcerated Women to explore whether an arts-based approach could help reduce the numbers of women returning to jail. In 2008, The Medea Project joined forces with UCSF's Women's HIV Clinic to become The Medea Project: Theatre for Incarcerated Women / HIV Circle with the intent to use theatre to explore what it means to be living with the virus in the 21st century. For the past 15 years, The Medea Project has performed shows all around the United States, sharing the truth and the stories of what it means to be female and infected or affected.