Arena Stage ad George Washington University will host a national, two-day creative conference at the Marvin Center on the campus of GW focused on exploring life during the Civil War, workshops on specific topics and issues of life during the War, and creating new theatrical, visual and movement-based work from these discoveries. The focus will be on bringing scholars and artists together to dialogue about the importance and immediacy of the Civil war, while exploring the in-depth history and how this history reverberates in participants' personal narratives - and then inviting participants to create based on this collision of the personal and historic.

The overarching goal of the project is to unite the perspectives and resources of the arts and academic communities in a wide-ranging, humanities-based exploration of civil conflict. The project will cross traditional boundaries by utilizing and uniting a range of academic and artistic disciplines.

James L. Swanson, the Edgar Award-winning author of the New York Times bestseller Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer, will do a special book reading and signing.

Featured presentations from GW professors Karen Ahlquist, associate professor of music; Tyler Anbinder, professor of history; Jennifer James, director of Africana Studies; Leslie Jacobson, professor of theater; Chris Sten, professor of English; Jim Miller, professor of English and American Studies; and Alan Wade, professor of theater. 

Interactive workshops from renowned artists and scholars Liz Lerman, independent artist and Civil War project conceiver; Raymond Caldwell, artist/director/divisor; Thembi Duncan, producing artistic director, African Continuum Theatre Company; C.R. Gibbs, author and lecturer; Hari Jones, assistant director and curator of the Washington, D.C. based African American Civil War Freedom Foundation and Museum; Jacqueline E. Lawson, playwright and artist; and John Moletress, interdisciplinary performance artist.  

Activites for both days are from  9:15am to 6pm.