Steven Raider-Ginsburg is Co-Founding Artistic Director of HartBeat Ensemble, an award-winning theater company in Hartford, CT that generates dynamic new works based on the most pressing issues of our times. Steven began his theater career at the groundbreaking New WORLD Theater, a landmark theater dedicated to new works that tell under-reported stories from overlooked peoples. From there, he went on to work with the San Francisco Mime Troupe, Anna Deveare-Smith at the Institute for Arts and Civic Dialogue, Shakespeare and Company, Augusto Boal, and The Civilians. Steven has been a teacher, playwright, actor and director. He was honored in American Theatre's twenty fith anniversary issue celebrating twenty five young theater artists who are most likely to influence American Theater in the next 25 years, the New Boston Fellowship as well as the National Comcast Leadership Award. He is a member of the 2012 Lincoln Center Directors Lab and also holds an MFA in Directing from Boston University. He is currently a Pierson College Fellow at Yale University and a COmmissioner of Cultural Affairs for the City of Hartford.