Women on Walls (2014)

Women on Walls (WOW), or Sit El 7eta, is an initiative using graffiti and street art to talk about women and women's rights. The film follows the preparations and the paintning of the murals/graffiti in Alexandria and Kairo in full daylight by different groups of artists. Pictures of historic women, popular women, murdered girls, women as victims and as heroes. The artists talks about their artistic role and the use of graffiti to send a message, to raise important issues. They talk about the brutality in the harassement of women, the resistance and the new images that can be seen and spread. The narrator/filmmaker makes connections to the thougths of alexandrian philosopher and mathematican Hypatia in 400 AD. We see the truth when we see the world, but we each have our own perspective. She was hence mutilated by a group of provoked men, and her dead body was burned. In the film we meet graffiti painters of both sexes. Men are also welcome to take part in WOW's street art and graffiti projects, and all with their own experiences. The film is poetic but also effectively forceful in revealing the problems of today. Music is from sufi musician Abdullah Miniawy. Art has the advantage of not presenting us one interpretation of the world. It gives us many. Street art and graffiti bring the full complexity of our lives into the public space. What we see changes how we think.