FINDING HOME is an animated documentary series telling the stories of climate refugees from around the world and setting out to reimagine the notion of “home”. Each episode features the testimony of an actual environmental refugee and uses the power of animation to convey the raw emotion behind these stories of resilience and adaptation by highlighting the life-shattering effects of climate change.
Our collection of diverse personal stories represents different aspects of the three main climate impacts that force people to flee: drought; ocean level rise; hurricanes, tsunamis and other extreme weather events. The project highlights the concrete impact of various climate issues on the global population which makes it a powerful communication tool to reach a large audience and raise awareness for action.
From American wildfires to Pacific islands disappearing due to ocean-level rise, we are witnessing the devastating effects of climate change every day. According to the latest research by UNHCR presented at COP29 titled NO ESCAPE: On the frontlines of Climate Change, Conflict and Forced Displacement “over the past 10 years, weather-related disasters have caused 220 million internal displacements – equivalent to approximately 60,000 displacements per day… By 2040, the number of countries facing extreme climate-related hazards is expected to rise from three to 65. Extreme heat will also rise significantly, with most refugee settlements and camps projected to experience twice as many days of dangerous heat by 2050.”
According to the International Organization of Migration "future forecasts vary from 25 million to 1 billion environmental migrants by 2050, moving either within their countries or across borders, on a permanent or temporary basis, with 200 million being the most widely cited estimate."
Our pilot episode had its French premiere at the National Animation Film Festival in Rennes, France in April ’22. Since then, the story of Jardenia, distributed by Miyu Distribution, France has been to 40+ international festivals. In 2025 FINDING HOME developed into an animated-documentary series which we plan to make available in two formats – twelve 7-minute webisodes and four 22-minute broadcast episodes. The target age of our audience is teenagers and adults. The goal of the series is to show, through personal testimonies, the concrete impact of climate change on people’s daily life and the environmental migration wave we are witnessing. We believe in the power of combining documentary stories with animation interpretations and rather than bombarding people with striking numbers, think that hearing first-hand individual stories is the most powerful way of creating social change. The protagonist voices in their original languages will be the narrators of the episodes.
Apart from the linear series format we plan to present the project in an interactive exhibition, available both physically and online. As part of the project dissemination it will aim to bring these personal stories and the scientific explanations behind them to a wide multi-million international audience which expands beyond the festival circuit and online TV. The exhibition will combine the episodes with the most updated climate data, provided by some of our partners. In this format FINDING HOME will be a communication engine for big international summits and will push institutions and organizations to act on new policies and practical solutions. At the same time, it could be used on a community level and tailored to local public spaces and educational initiatives. Our long-term impact focus will be on the global recognition of Ecological asylum. We believe the time for these efforts is right as a recent ruling by the UN Human Rights Committee strengthens the case for recognizing environmental dangers relevant to asylum applications. The Finding Home series will be used to add grass-roots social pressure behind this cause. This website is a beta version of our future exhibition.
is a film director/producer and founder of ANIMADOCS, an independent film production house based between Sofia, Bulgaria and Bordeaux, France. A graduate of Sofia University, Central European University and New York Film Academy’s Documentary filmmaking program, Maria has over 15 years of experience working on social-issue documentaries, independent animation and experimenting with mixed genres. The animated-documentary “Father” which she produced in 2012 was screened at over 100 film festivals and awarded 28 times, including the Golden Dove for Animated Film at DOK Leipzig Festival. Her 2016 animated campaign “Together to End Male Guardianship”, commissioned by Human Rights Watch Saudi Arabia, was seen by over 10 million people and brought factual legislative change to the country. She is currently working on her first animated-documentary feature film on global female reproductive rights “I’m Every Woman“ (co-directed/produced by Ruxandra Gubernat) and “Finding Home” – a short web/broadcast series and interactive art installation. Maria is a faculty member of the New York Film Academy’s Documentary Department and teaches “Animation for Documentary Film” in Europe and the USA. Berlinale Talent 2016 and 2019 (with the "Finding Home project at Talents Short Film Station Project Lab). In 2024 she was awarded with the prestigious New York State Council of the Arts / New York Foundation for the Arts Artistic Fellowship in the Video/Film category.
is an independent producer. Her company, Iliade et Films, is based in Paris, France. After graduating in Political Science in 2014, she began her career as production secretary. In 2015, she joined Kazak Productions, where she worked on feature projects directed by Virgil Vernier and Clément Cogitore. She was also in charge of three animated short films: "The Night of the Plastic Bags" by Gabriel Harel (Best Animated Short film at the César 2020), "Make it Soul" by Jean-Charles Mbotti Malolo and Adi Mérigeau's "Genius Loci" (Academy Award nominee for Best animated short film in 2021). In 2017, she decided to devote herself to independent animation and joined Sacrebleu productions, where she was hired as production manager. She worked alongside Agnès Patron, Céline Devaux, Michaela Pavlatova and others. Since 2018, she is associated with Oury Milshtein at Iliade et Films, where she develops and produces films by emerging authors in both animation and live-action. Her latest production, "Yuck!" by Loïc Espuche, coproduced with Ikki Films, is nominated for the 2025 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.
is an awarded Sofia-based graphic designer, illustrator and art director. Her animation portfolio includes “Father” (Co-director and designer, 2012, awarded 28 international awards, including the Golden Dove for Animated Film at DOK Leipzig Festival 2012), “Traveling Country” (Production Designer, 2016, awarded 11 international awards including Best Croatian Film at Animafest Zagreb 2016), “The Trump and Jesus Show” (Art Director, 2016), “Together to end Male Guardianship” (Art director, 2016, Human Rights Watch viral campaign) and "The wicked wit of Jane Austen" (Director and Designer, 2019, TED-Ed lesson).
is an illustrator and graphic designer based in Sofia. She graduated majoring in "Poster and Visual Communication" at the National Academy of Fine Arts, Sofia. She illustrates and designs textbooks for leading Bulgarian publishing houses, one of the educational series she designed and illustrated won the BELMA gold medal for the Best European textbook in 2019. Antonia is behind the main campaign visions of the Emprove foundation in Bulgaria, which helps women overcome domestic violence. Her illustrations are featured in three books by contemporary Bulgarian authors, which got her selected for Bulgaria's national stand at the Children's Book Fair in Bologna in 2024.
is a French composer and sound designer. A multi-instrumentalist, he has written the original score for numerous fiction and animation shorts, including "And then the Bear" (Fr. "L’Heure de l’Ours"), directed by Agnès Patron (in competition at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, César 2021 for Best Animation Short film, Best Original Score at Music&Cinema Marseille Film Festival). He recently collaborated with directors Marie Larrivé ("Noir-Soleil" / César 2023 nominee), Tal Kantor ("Letter to a pig" / Oscars 2024 nominee), Florence Miailhe ("Papillon" / World Premiere and Crystal Bear at Berlinale Generation 2024), Shuchi Talati ("Girls will be girls" / World premiere and 2 awards at Sundance Film Festival 2024), Maya Dreifuss ("Highway 65" / World premiere and grand prix at Reims Polar film festival 2024) and Raphaël Jouzeau ("Scars we love" / World premiere at Cannes Film Festival 2024). Pierre is a Berlinale Talents 2024 alumni.
https://cargocollective.com/pierreoberkampf
is a climate science researcher who specializes in using advanced climate models and data science to study ocean warming patterns and their effects on global climate. With a background in Earth and Environmental Science (St. Xavier’s College and Jawaharlal Nehru University, India) and a PhD in Climate Science (University of New South Wales, Australia), Shreya has worked on diverse projects, including climate modeling at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology (Germany) and physical risk assessments for industry and policy. Interested in science communication, she collaborates with artists and media organizations to make climate science more accessible. Dr. Dhame is the author of the “Science Check” column, which explains the scientific climate facts behind each one of our episodes.
Are you displaced by climate?
Fill in this form, tell us your story and you can be the character in one of our future episodes!
By submitting the form you agree to be part of the Finding home project and share your story publicly. Please note that uploading large video files can take longer depending on your internet connection. Should you have any issues, please send us a link to your files at story@findinghome.info.
If you work with displaced people, have data on climate displacement or simply want to support us, please get in touch at partners@findinghome.info
Do you want to host our exhibition? It could be for a policy debate on climate or any educational format, please get in touch at exhibition@findinghome.info
Our project is supported by The Redford Centre which has become Finding Home’s fiscal sponsor, i.e. donors can make tax-deductible donations towards our production and the Centre is responsible for making sure they are being used for their intended purpose. You can make a donation using our donation page.
FINDING HOME was one of ten short projects selected for the 2019 Berlinale Talents Short Film Station Project Lab and invited to a special Berlinale Sustainability panel, hosted by UNESCO. The project was pitched at Cartoon and CEE Animation forums. The pilot received support from the French National Film Centre (CNC Audiovisual Innovation Fund), regional grant from Nouvelle Aquitaine, and co-production short film funding from the Bulgarian National Film Centre.
The project expanded into a series and got developed further at the IDF East Doc Series program. As part of it, in 2022 it was pitched at the EastDoc Platform (Prague), Sunny Side of the Doc (La Rochelle, where it received the Special Post-production Award from Alhambra Studios) and IDFA (Amsterdam). The series received The Redford Centre Development Grant and joined a cohort of twelve awarded films which reflect a diversity of intersectional environmental themes. “These twelve films are very special. They represent a mix of stories and solutions that our industry and audiences urgently need, now more than ever.” said Redford Center grants advisor Brenda Robinson, “At a time when the climate emergency is finally on almost everyone’s mind – including growing acknowledgment from Hollywood – these films spotlight issues we all need to know about and support before it’s too late.” In 2024 FINDING HOME got supported by the European Commission’s Creative Europe MEDIA co-development grant and received the Bloomberg Green Festival Competition Award in Seattle, USA which will be used towards the series’ development.
