Ece Temelkuran: Nation of Strangers

‘Dear stranger. Are you home? Do you feel at home? For how much longer?’

Across the world, the number of refugees and exiles, the dispossessed and displaced, the politically homeless and the economically excluded is growing. In the decade since she left her own home of Türkiye, Ece Temelkuran has been a political Cassandra, warning those convinced it couldn’t happen in their country that fascism is coming.

Now, as oppression spreads and temperatures rise – as we face competing crises and learn, again and again, that no institution is so concrete it can’t turn to dust, and no home is too strong to be destroyed – she has written Nation of Strangers: Rebuilding Home in the 21st Century, which is a series of letters from one stranger to another.

Politically attuned and deeply personal, this heartening correspondence is poetic yet precise. It shows how, as we all become strangers, our home will depend on the strength we find with one another.

Brian Eno, a musician, producer, visual artist and activist, first came to international prominence in the early 1970s as a founding member of the British band Roxy Music. He went on to create a series of solo albums and take part in varied collaborations.

His work as a producer includes albums with Talking Heads, Devo, U2 and Coldplay, while his long list of collaborations include recordings with David Bowie, Jon Hassell, Grace Jones, Fred again.. and his brother, Roger Eno.

A co-founder of EarthPercent, which partners with artists to divert a percentage of music industry earnings to impactful causes, and Hard Art, a cultural collective focused on solidarity in the face of climate and democratic collapse, Eno is also a visual artist whose works have been exhibited worldwide.

He received the Venice Biennale’s Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2023. His new book, What Art Does, was published in 2025.