What is it like to be forced to leave the country you were born in? Whatever the circumstances, leaving behind a life / a language / a part of your identity is a complex process. The twentieth century has seen numerous writers and artists leaving their homes, fleeing persecution and/or finding it impossible to produce work in the political climate of their home country. Voices of their generations, they had to start afresh in a new place, processing the complicated relationship with the country they had left behind. Their torments echo in the heart of anyone who no longer belongs to a place they once left.

This project aims to give voice to the written word of the past, uniting voices of different generations and nationalities to create a supranational portrait of (in)voluntary exile. In the third decade of the 21st century, we are once again divided by borders, judged on the basis of the political decisions of the countries that our passports belong to. More people every day flee / leave the countries they were born in, facing the same dilemmas faced by many in the 20th century.

Yet in the chaos of today, there still is something that brings us unity - the genuine, lived human experience. Creatives who escaped the horrors of war and oppressive regimes brought their lived truth and their unique perspective to new places, improving communication and mutual understanding on the human level. Now more than ever, their stories invoke a feeling of unity for many of us who have left behind the homes we were born into, voluntarily or not.

To me, the written word has always held special power. Growing up, it has in many ways been my main source of information, a way to understand others. In this project, I wanted to amplify the written words by giving them voices that speak the same language. As humans, we are distributed through space and time, divided by it. This project brings people who left behind the home they have once known together, bending time and space, and creating a singular point of connection.

The audio piece features recordings of people reading out the quotes in their native language with English subtitles. Despite the differences represented by the variety of languages, the intrinsic value of human experience is unifying. At the same time, the booklet provides further information on the participants: the authors of the quotes and the people who are reading them out, continuing the narrative of a cross-temporal meeting point. Those of us who had once left our homes and countries might recognise the same pain of feeling torn apart and never quite at home in the words written decades away, by people we have never met.