Woodstock Opera House

Pop Up Paracon 2: 2024 Midwest Paranormal Conference & VIP Ghost Hunt

General Admission ticket includes:

* Vendor rooms and Speaking events 
* Panel discussion hosted by Dave Schrader.
* Opportunity to meet speakers and connect with fellow paranormal enthusiasts.
* In and out privileges to enjoy the Farmers market, restaurants, and stores.
* Program flyer of schedule

VIP All Access holders additionally enjoy:

*  Admission to both Friday and Saturday with early admission Saturday (10 AM)
*  Special Ghost Hunt on Friday Night @ Woodstock Opera House (9 PM to 12 AM)
*  VIP Seating

10/4 - $30 Adult / $10 Student
10/5 - $50 Adult / $20 Student
2-day - $69 Adult / $30 Student
VIP - $199 All Tickets -  Limited (if purchasing the VIP, you don't need any other ticket)

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Thomas Swick

Falling into Place - The Cold War Love Story of a Would-Be Travel Writer and Almost-Spy

In 1978, at the height of Soviet Bloc tensions, Thomas Swick moved to Poland to be with his future wife, Hania. The young journalist and aspiring travel writer had no idea he would, in the next decade, witness the rise of Solidarity and the imposition of martial law, decline an invitation to be an informant for the regime, and walk with thousands of Poles to Czestochowa, an annual pilgrimage that blossomed into a nine-day protest march. He discovered that to be a travel writer it helps to live in a place and learn the language, but to be a good traveler all you need is curiosity and a sense of wonder.

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Jonathan Eig

King: A Life

Drawing on a landslide of recently declassified White House telephone transcripts and FBI files, award-winning biographer Jonathan Eig presents a revelatory new portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., infusing it with the narrative energy of a thriller. Dr. King was a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death. A deep thinker, brilliant strategist, and committed radical, he built a reform movement on the most American of pillars: the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, and the American dream.

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Margot Shaw

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Patrick Bringley

All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me

Grieving the loss of his older brother to cancer, Patrick Bringley quit his job at the New Yorker magazine and went to work as a security guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. His idea was to “stand still awhile,” to drink in the beauty all around him while directing visitors to the restrooms and the mummies, to find comfort with no thought of moving forward. The exquisite account of his ten years at the Met--including a tour of masterpieces and their creators--is a lesson in learning not “about art, but from it” as well as a meditation on finding joy in both the exalted and the mundane.

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Phil Vettel

The Golden Age of Chicago Dining

He could send panic through a restaurant’s staff when he arrived, but while they freaked out, he was always rooting for them. An acclaimed Chicago Tribune journalist who was its food critic for 31 years, Phil Vettel witnessed the evolution of the Chicago food scene, covering talents like Charlie Trotter, Grant Achatz, and Stephanie Izard. In the process, he brought attention to Chicago as one of the nation’s finest culinary destinations. For 11 years, he served on the James Beard Foundation’s Restaurant and Chef Awards Committee. You’ve trusted his reviews. Now get his ringside point of view on the Chicago food scene and the culinary giants who make it sizzle.

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM

Woodstock Fine Arts Association's 61st Annual Creative Living Series 
Heidi Stevens

The Secret Power of Storytelling

For the past decade Heidi Stevens wrote The Chicago Tribune daily column “Balancing Act” and maintains a nationally syndicated column. She specializes in stories of love and belief and wonder and enthusiasm and joy and grief and hardship and down-and-outers and celebrities and everyday folks. You’ve read them. You’ve laughed and cried over them. With the wisdom that comes from listening, she shares the stories of some of those she’s written about, of her own life and experiences, and of the secret power she’s discovered in storytelling—that stories, reminding us of what we have in common, have the superpower to connect us.

TICKET SALE DATES
SERIES RENEWAL:  April 18, 2024 1:00 PM
SERIES:  June 4, 2024 10:00 AM
INDIVIDUAL:  September 10, 2024 10:00 AM