Last Thursday, the walls of NYUAD's Downtown Campus got just a little brighter as the NYUAD Institute unveiled its exhibition of The 99, a comic book based on Islamic history that has become a global sensation. The impressive collection features original art, cover designs, and select pages, detailing the publication's meteoric rise in popularity across both Arabic- and English-speaking worlds.

In the four short years since the introduction of The 99, the comic has been translated into eight languages and spawned countless successes including a theme park in Kuwait, an upcoming animated series, and a comic book mini-series in which The 99 joins forces with DC Comic's Justice League. Forbes magazine deemed the comic one of 20 trends sweeping the globe, and President Obama even mentioned the comic's creator, Naif al-Mutawa, as one of the people promoting exchange of ideas between the United States and Muslim societies.

Al-Mutawa's Muslim-based comic book is the first of its kind, with the actions of its characters promoting a positive image of Islam while also encouraging cross-cultural dialogue and collaboration.

The exhibition, which was first installed at 19 Washington Square North in New York last fall, will eventually open to the Abu Dhabi public; those interested should visit the NYUAD Institute's Calendar of Events soon for information. In addition, al-Mutawa — who was recently selected as one of the 500 most influential Muslims in the world by The Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center — will participate in an NYUAD Institute public event, in conjunction with the Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation, on February 21, entitled, "Repositioning Islam Through The 99."