Artist Statement
This work began from a dream I had in Beijing, China, exactly a year after my father died. I had not been allowed to speak at his funeral, which I felt was an important rite of passage. In my dream I was shouting, saying how important it was for me to speak at his funeral. No one could hear me. It felt like I was speaking behind thick glass and at times, through water.
I took this dream experience into a physical process where I wrote down on paper what was important for me to say, and then filmed myself saying these words into a square, glass box of water. In turn, I asked others from my community in Beijing to do the same. As I was in China, I assumed their concerns would be of political issues and the larger picture lying behind the outer glossy sheen of the economic boom in China’s capital. But their inner life movements in relation to such cultural upheaval were unexpected: concerns of personal relationships and emotional censorship.
Captions
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Speaking Through Water, 2006
Nathalie Latham, Translation, 2006
Number of Images: 8 movies, approx. 10 still images
