We have spotlighted the work of PositiveNegatives, an organisation who “create compelling animations, comics and podcasts about pressing social, humanitarian and environmental issues”, a number of times over the years at Broken Frontier. Their ethos of using comics as a form as a socially conscious narrative tool for communicating lived experiences aligns perfectly with one of our core missions here at BF after all. Check out our interview with them a few years back, for example, or Fahmida Azim’s creator commentary on webcomic I Am a Leader of My House, or our review of Vanni: A Family’s Struggle Through the Sri Lankan Conflict. This month they will be spotlighting some of their projects at a new exhibition at SOAS, University of London. Full details on ‘Stories of Migration’ in the press release below.
Stories of Migration
New exhibition showcases powerful stories of global movement through graphic novels, comics, and animation.
SOAS Gallery, 16 Jan – 22 March 2025
The history of our world is a long story of migration; the journey of peoples across lands and continents, pushed by climate or conflict, drawn by the prospect of a better life elsewhere. While these stories are often absorbed into global narratives and headlines, the award-winning PositiveNegatives turns them into striking visual artwork, making their journeys and experiences instantly accessible.
Based at SOAS University of London, PositiveNegatives is a non-profit organisation that specialises in transforming ethnographic research into compelling illustrated and animated stories. Founded in 2012 by Dr Benjamin Worku-Dix, they engage a network of visual artists to bring these to life, many of whom have lived experience of their subject matter.
Showing as a single exhibition for the first time, Stories of Migration brings together 15 comics and animations from PositiveNegatives artists, including 2024 Pulitzer Prize finalist Ren Galeno, Gabi Froden, Daniel Locke, Majid Adin, Asia Alfasi, Karrie Fransman and Lindsay Pollock. Each project has been developed with a leading academic institution, including SOAS, UCL, Sussex, Coventry and the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO).
Stories of Migration takes audiences on a dynamic visual journey covering three distinct aspects of migration; home, the journey, and destination. Archival material from over a decade of work will be displayed, including sketches, reference photographs and developmental artwork.
The exhibition also launches PositiveNegatives’ latest initiative, Animated Learning, which builds on the essence of each project to develop inspiring educational resources for students and educators. Schools local to the gallery will be invited to visit the exhibition, with workshops facilitated by the artists themselves.
Speaking about the exhibition, Founding Director of PositiveNegatives, Dr Benjamin Worku-Dix, said: “The story of migration is one that never truly ends. There are always new voices to amplify, new challenges to highlight and new solutions to seek. This exhibition gives visitors the chance to immerse themselves in previous chapters and play a part in the next.”
