About Oakbeam
Visual communication for complex work that needs to hold together.
Oakbeam Pictures is a UK-based visual communication studio helping organisations turn complex research, policy, evidence and lived experience into clear visual stories, systems and assets.
The studio is led by Matthew Keen, an animation director and visual storyteller with over 20 years’ professional experience creating public-facing work for organisations including IDMC, UNIDO, The Open University, IREX, C40 Cities and the Global Covenant of Mayors.
Founder-led, specialist by design
Oakbeam is founder-led and built around a flexible network of trusted creative and strategic specialists. Matthew works directly with clients to understand the context, audience, sensitivities and purpose behind each project, then leads the creative and production process from early thinking through to final delivery.
When a brief needs additional expertise, Oakbeam brings in the right collaborators around the work. This might include research consultants, writers, copy editors, data visualisation specialists, designers, illustrators, animators, voice artists or sound designers.
This allows the team to shape and deliver animated films, visual systems, social assets, event graphics, presentation materials and short-form content that feel connected, coherent and purposeful across formats.
Our work sits between strategic communication, narrative design and animation. Much of it begins with structure: what needs to be understood, who needs to understand it, what must not be lost, and how the message needs to hold together across different formats.
Across sectors including climate, displacement, governance, education, justice, health and social impact, the focus is the same: helping important ideas become easier to understand, easier to share and harder to ignore.
“Often the message is already there, but it has not yet found its shape. My role is to help find the narrative inside the research, evidence or lived experience, work out how it should unfold over time, and decide what needs to be understood, what needs to be felt, and how visual communication can help it land.”
— Matthew Keen
Founder and Director, Oakbeam Pictures