The documentary that captures the grueling, decade-long effort to build America’s new national World War I memorial has just landed a major festival prize—a sign that audiences are hungry for stories about classical craftsmanship and cultural memory. Traci L. Slatton’s HEROIC: Sabin Howard Sculpts the National WWI Memorial took home the Audience Award for Best Art, Architecture + Design Feature at the 2026 Newport Beach Film Festival, tying with Leica – A Century of Vision.
Traci L. Slatton’s documentary ‘Heroic’ captures Sabin Howard’s nine-year battle to create the National WWI Memorial sculpture. January 2027 digital release.
HEROIC is not just a film about the making of a monument; it is a testament to what is required to create enduring art in the modern age.”— Traci L. Slatton, Director, HEROIC
NEWPORT BEACH, CA, UNITED STATES, November 6, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — The award comes as the film gears up for a wider audience. Freestyle Digital Media, a division of Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group, has already acquired digital distribution rights. The documentary brings A Soldier’s Journey—a staggering 58-foot-long, 25-ton bronze relief—from its home at the National WWI Memorial in Washington, D.C., directly to screens everywhere.
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For cultural heavyweights ranging from the Vatican’s institutions to the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) and international art academies, HEROIC represents more than just a film. It signals what its makers call a return to classical humanism—a deliberate pivot away from post-modern fragmentation toward painstaking, physical artistry. The documentary follows Sabin Howard’s nine-year struggle to complete the largest freestanding high-relief bronze sculpture in the Western Hemisphere, a piece featuring 38 larger-than-life figures.
Slatton, an internationally bestselling author, did not simply document this process from the sidelines. She inhabited three overlapping and often conflicting roles: director, project manager, and wife to the master sculptor. While Howard wrestled clay into form, bringing in real combat veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan to serve as live models, Slatton ran the war room. Her camera captured the ticking-clock saga with unfiltered intimacy, as she simultaneously fought federal design battles, navigated pandemic shutdowns, and managed the intense pressures that bled into their marriage and studio.
“HEROIC is not just a film about the making of a monument; it is a testament to what is required to create enduring art in the modern age,” Slatton said. “Sabin and I were driven by a duty to the veterans who sacrificed everything, and to a global culture that is hungry for art that elevates our shared humanity. To see this resonate so deeply with audiences at Newport Beach is deeply satisfying. We can still build beautiful things. And the world is ready to embrace monumental storytelling once again.”
KEY HIGHLIGHTS OF THE MONUMENT AND THE FILM
- Unprecedented Scale: A Soldier’s Journey is the largest freestanding high-relief bronze sculpture in the Western Hemisphere, featuring 38 larger-than-life figures.
- Profound Human Connection: Modern combat veterans stepped in as live models, bringing their own experience of combat into the faces of the World War I soldiers.
- A Cultural Renaissance: The monument and the film represent a bold rejection of post-modern fragmentation, returning to the highest standards of classical craftsmanship and narrative art.
- Extreme Filmmaking: A rare, nine-year firsthand account where the director’s responsibility to deliver a multimillion-dollar memorial clashed directly with the demands of compelling cinema.
For cultural institutions seeking art that inspires, unites, and remembers, HEROIC stands as both a blueprint and a battle cry. The film proves that the capacity for generational, transcendent art is not lost to history.
HEROIC: Sabin Howard Sculpts the National WWI Memorial will digitally release in January 2027. For early screening access, press inquiries, or institutional exhibition requests, visit heroicdocumentary.com or contact the media representative below.
MEDIA CONTACT
Michelle Czernin von Chudenitz
EPEC Media
michelle@epecmedia.com | 310-600-0575
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR
Traci L. Slatton is an internationally bestselling author, director, and project manager. Her unique position at the intersection of literary storytelling, monumental art production, and documentary filmmaking provides an unmatched lens into the human cost of artistic creation.
Michelle Czernin von Chudenitz
EPEC Media
+1 310-600-0575
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Why it matters: In an era when digital content often dominates, this film’s festival win and upcoming release prove that audiences still crave stories about physical, monumental art and the human sacrifice behind it. HEROIC offers a rare blueprint for how classical craftsmanship can find new life, and how a single work can unite cultural institutions, veterans, and global audiences around a shared sense of dignity and memory.
