The Wall Speaks:

The inspiration of “The Wall Speaks” is first sparked by the conversation between Sarah and her mentor, Dr Cissie Fu on how the pandemic can magnify or shrink oneself. Sarah remembered when hate language/racial slurs were painted on a wall near her dad’s workplace in Chinatown, Vancouver BC in the beginning of the pandemic. She was anxious, terrified and angry. After seeing the startling image, she sees graffiti as intimidating and dangerous. She also feels like the walls are “tagged”/“marked” by someone as a territory to keep her away from that space. Later on, Cissie and Sarah talked about the history of graffiti, the ephemerality of graffiti (as it can be painted over) and how graffiti artists use the “unclaimed public spaces” to magnify their unheard stories. Even though it is absolutely disrespectful and unethical to put hate language on walls, there is graffiti that inspires, builds, reclaims power and reignites ambitions. Sarah filmed this project in the alley on West Hastings and Cambie street. This time as she approached the wall with ease, she found beauty in the graffiti and she attempted to create a conversation with the walls using her body. She moves with the walls, feeling the shapes, colours, visuals, voices of the graffiti in her body, and finding forgiveness and relief within herself in response to the hateful graffiti she first saw. Sarah captures the two ephemeral art forms (movement and graffiti) and composes them into one long-lived video archive.