About the Event

Join us for The Living Archive: Art, Memory, and Civic Imagination, a day-long festival that centers women’s creative practices as vital tools for shaping cultural memory and envisioning more just futures.

Presented in partnership with Well-Read Black Girl—an organization dedicated to amplifying the voices of Black women writers and cultivating literary spaces rooted in community, care, and intellectual exchange—this gathering brings together writers, artists, and cultural leaders who approach the archive not as a static record, but as a living practice shaped through storytelling, art-making, and civic participation. In alignment with NMWA’s commitment to elevating women’s voices across disciplines, the festival highlights how creative expression can serve as both personal testimony and collective action.

Across three panels, explore how Black women document their inner lives, preserve collective memory, and engage history as an act of authorship, stewardship, and cultural responsibility. Together, these conversations illuminate the power of women artists and cultural leaders to challenge dominant narratives, foster community, and inspire social change.

Panel descriptions and speakers will be announced in March.

About Well-Read Black Girl

This program is presented in partnership with Well-Read Black Girl, a global literary community dedicated to Black women. Well-Read Black Girl aims to introduce a cohort of diverse writers to future generations and to address inequalities and improve communities through reading and reflecting on the works of Black women.