This year, we asked artists to go further. To sit in the uncomfortable places. To peel back the polished surface and show us what lies beneath — the doubt, the grief, the quiet triumphs that never make the headlines. We asked them to trust us with the parts of themselves that don’t fit neatly into a press release.

At neun, we have never been interested in image. We are interested in truth. In the unorthodox, the challenging, the conversations that leave you changed. We believe that creativity is not a performance but a reckoning — with self, with history, with the world as it is and as it could be. Art, at its most alive, does not decorate. It excavates. It asks questions that have no easy answers. It holds a mirror up and waits.

The artists who graced these pages in 2025 understood this. They came with open hands. They trusted us with their fractures, their becoming, their stubborn refusal to be anything less than whole. They reminded us that to create is an act of courage — that to share one’s work is to stand unguarded in a world that often rewards armour. They did not perform for us. They arrived as themselves, with all the mess and beauty that entails.

And in arriving, they gave us something back. They made us stop, think, reassess — question our own decisions and visions. Some showed us the quiet strength of the human spirit. Others threw themselves into service not for recognition but to lift others into their own success. There were those who refused to perform perfection, choosing instead to articulate the silences we had all been taught to keep. There were artists who transformed cramped concrete into vibrant hope, who turned aid boxes into exhibitions, who brought the silenced histories of their people into light. Each conversation became a source of energy — something to harness each day in an age that so often feels inhuman. They reminded us that confusion can be more honest than certainty, that vulnerability is not weakness but revolution, and that to create against all odds is the most defiant act of hope.

We do not exist to celebrate fame. We exist to amplify voices that matter — voices that challenge, illuminate, and invite us into deeper seeing. We want readers to encounter artists not as distant figures on pedestals, but as fellow humans navigating the same fragile, extraordinary life. The same questions. The same held breath. The same longing to be seen and understood.

This year tested that vision. Gaza broke our hearts — a million cries buried under fire and rubble. We held space for stories that were painful, urgent, and necessary. We sat with grief that was not ours but felt close enough to touch. We listened when listening was the only offering we had. Some conversations left us undone. Some left us more certain than ever of why this work matters.

One artist reminded us that grief is not a door that closes. It is love with nowhere left to go. That single understanding has stayed with us — a lantern in the dark.

As we close this year, we carry forward the same vision: to offer a platform where artists can exist in all their splendour. Where openness is not feared but honoured. Where the torture and the tenderness of making art are held with equal reverence. Where no story is too small if it is told with honesty, and no voice too quiet if it speaks from the heart.

To our readers: look out. Not to your screens, your feeds, your endless scrolling — but out. Life is happening every second, and you might miss its beauty. The world does not need more content. It needs more presence.

Thank you for walking with us. Thank you for reading. Thank you for believing that depth and humanity still matter.

Here’s to 2026 — and to the artists brave enough to go further still.