In this hands-on breakout session, writer and educator Laura Lehman shows how art and poetry can deepen historical research, spark story ideas, and help writers maintain a long-term creative practice. Drawing on her experience teaching creative writing and American literature, Laura demonstrates how playful, repeatable exercises can yield serious results for novelists, poets, and storytellers alike.

You’ll learn how to:

• Use paintings, photographs, and other artworks as portals into historical worlds

• Apply warm-up routines like Synectics prompts to unlock imaginative thinking

• Practice “writing beyond the frame” to explore what happens before, after, or outside a historical image

• Reframe poetry as “felt thought” and a way to connect emotion with narrative insight

• Employ layered annotation techniques to extract themes, language, and imagery for your own work

• Use simple brain-science tips to overcome writer’s block and refresh your creative flow

• Treat art as historical research, capturing mood, tension, and tone from a given period

• Build routine, low-stakes exercises to sustain creativity and avoid burnout

This session equips historical fiction writers, educators, and language enthusiasts with concrete practices to integrate art into research, generate story ideas, and keep creativity alive—even during long projects.