VICTORIOUS VOICES x SURVIVORS WEST YORKSHIRE

Challenging the Silence: Huddersfield, 2026

On 24th April 2026, the ninth Victorious Voices exhibition was presented at the University of Huddersfield for the third Challenging the Silence: Male Survivor Needs seminar. Following Leeds and Bradford, the series brought survivor portraits and testimonies into a university setting closely connected to the research being discussed.

The exhibition was installed in the Shorehead Suite and remained open beyond the seminar itself. Visitors did not need a seminar ticket to see the work. That distinction mattered: the portraits could be encountered both by people attending a professional discussion and by those who simply wanted to spend time with survivors’ stories.

Alongside the exhibition, Survivors West Yorkshire shared its experience of supporting male survivors through Ben’s Place, while Dr Stacey Maher presented research into the sexual abuse of boys and the barriers men can face in seeking recognition and support. Victorious Voices brought another form of knowledge into view. Its black-and-white portraits and first-person testimonies allowed participants to speak as individuals, beyond the categories used in research or services.

Together, the work and the seminar asked how silence is sustained: through stigma, through assumptions about who can be a victim, and through systems that may fail to recognise what someone is trying to tell them. The portraits offered no single account of survival. Each person had chosen how to be seen and what to share.

In Huddersfield, the exhibition made space for those choices within the university and beyond the seminar room. It invited visitors to look closely, listen on survivors’ terms, and consider how their words might shape a better response.