Thursday, October 1, 2026
6:00 PM – 8:30 PM EDT
Bringing History to Life: AI and Documentary Storytelling
About this event
A screening of PBS's Declarations followed by a panel on how filmmakers used AI to animate historical artwork where no visual record exists, with director Stacey Holman and Howard Law's Roy Austin Jr.
A screening and panel on a genuinely interesting problem: how do you make a documentary about people whose lives were never photographed?
The evening opens with PBS's "Declarations: Black Americans and the Revolutionary War," a Virginia Public Media production that combines historical scholarship with original artwork animated using AI tools, precisely because no contemporaneous visual record of its subjects exists.
The panel that follows takes up how the filmmakers made those choices, and where the line sits between AI as a supportive creative instrument and AI as a substitute for human judgment about the historical record. Speakers are Stacey L. Holman, the film's director, and Roy L. Austin Jr., Director of the AI Initiative at Howard University School of Law, moderated by Michon Boston.
Doors at 5:30 for a 6:00 start. Part of March On Festival 2026, with partners NCTA and VPM. Tickets range from free to 55 dollars. The venue on Massachusetts Avenue NW has a street-level entrance and a nearby managed garage.
Organized by
A Washington DC film and culture organisation programming screenings and panels at the intersection of storytelling, history and technology, including how documentary makers are using AI tools.