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Christine Sun Kim in “Friends & Strangers” - Season 11 | Art21

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    ♪ethereal ambient music♪
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    [interpreter VO] I've just been noticing
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    that my life is just one big echo.
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    ♪sparse ethereal music♪
    Or, rather, maybe just small
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    echoes that become one big echo,
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    and that's something that's
    been a part of my life
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    since I was born.
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    And it has to deal with repetition,
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    ♪♪♪
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    patterns,
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    something that constantly comes up.
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    When I work with interpreters,
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    I experience repetition.
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    Like, whatever I sign, Beth repeats.
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    She's echoing me.
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    And sign language is full of echoes.
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    You can use one hand shape,
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    and echo that, repeat that,
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    and it just changes the entire
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    sign or the entire word based on
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    where you put it on your body.
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    ♪♪♪
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    The shape of the sign for "future,"
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    which is two semicircles
    away from your face,
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    that's the sign for "future,"
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    it has a line that you can follow,
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    so I drew that line.
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    And it's an echo in and of itself.
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    ♪♪♪
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    And so since it's my ideas,
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    it's my work that's being presented,
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    and a lot of it does have to do
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    with repetition and a lot of it
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    is full of echoes,
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    I think that is why I want to be
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    as clear as possible. [chuckles]
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    ♪pulsating ethereal music♪
    - [Interpreter] I'm DJ Kurs of Deaf West Theater.
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    At Deaf West Theater,
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    we bridge deaf and hearing
    worlds through theater.
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    We're advancing visibility
    and representation.
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    But I'm jealous of Christine Sun Kim,
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    because she does the same thing,
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    but on her own.
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    She can draw a pie chart on paper
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    and have a similar impact.
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    Please welcome artist Christine Sun Kim.
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    [applause]
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    - [Christine] So this
    tweet here that says,
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    "I can 100 percent promise that you
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    "learning sign language is easier
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    "than a deaf person learning to hear"
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    is a tweet from a deaf writer,
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    and I think that this framing
    ...is it. [chuckles]
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    This is how I want you
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    to think about who I am.
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    This is my deaf identity,
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    and this is where I'm coming from.
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    ♪sparse piano music♪
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    People love to always
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    ask why I don't read lips,
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    so this is a question I've
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    gotten over and over again.
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    ♪♪♪
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    I love the use of infographics.
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    It's this idea, shown visually,
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    that can be communicated without barriers.
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    It can cross languages,
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    it can cross cultures.
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    So this is the same old [bleep]
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    hearing people say to me.
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    And as you can see,
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    this is equally distributed because
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    people say a lot of [bleep] to me.
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    [laughter]
    ♪ethereal synth music♪
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    - [Interpreter] They look so good!
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    - [Man] Cute!
    -[interpreter] [laughs]
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    - [Christine] Can you lift yours up more,
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    just a smidgen?
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    Yes.
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    Okay, that's what we want.
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    -That one up.
    - [Man] This might be low.
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    - [Interpreter] She
    hasn't mentioned yours.
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    - [Man] Okay.
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    - [interpreter VO] I am very
    comfortable with collaboration.
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    [interpreter] I think that looks good.
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    [interpreter VO] I usually work with people,
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    whether that's interpreters that
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    I'm working with or people who
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    are speaking on my behalf.
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    I'm used to that.
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    ♪♪♪
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    I collaborate with my
    partner, Tom Mader, a lot
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    and this has been really
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    nice because I've been able
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    to kind of increase
    who I collaborate with.
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    ♪♪♪
    - So, we've all grown as artists,
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    and lecturers and performers,
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    so let's not do that,
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    but it's still very easy
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    to find online.
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    - [interpreter VO] Motherhood has
    really impacted my practice.
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    It's impacted the way I envision
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    and the way I approach art.
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    ♪♪♪
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    I allow my child to be a
    part of the process at times.
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    Sometimes we collaborate on a project.
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    ♪♪♪
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    Often, I work with musical notation.
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    I've really thought about the
    emptiness of the staff lines.
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    It's not about the notes, necessarily,
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    but it's about the
    foundation that's being laid.
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    And I decided to incorporate our family.
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    I've done one,
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    Tom has done one,
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    and Roux has done one.
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    When I sat down with Roux
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    and I explained the work,
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    she created this drawing,
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    and then she did another
    one with notes on it.
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    And I asked her what it was,
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    and she said to me
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    it was a song about family.
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    [laughter]
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    I've lived in Berlin
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    now for almost 10 years.
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    As an artist, I'm having
    a great life there,
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    because I feel like
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    there's so much less pressure.
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    ♪bubbly synth music♪
    What I've noticed is that being
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    a parent doesn't have a dent
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    or an impact on my bank
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    account almost at all.
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    Daycare is free.
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    Everything in the city is affordable,
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    [chuckles] especially compared to
    a place like New York
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    or Los Angeles.
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    And I also have space to create work.
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    ♪♪♪
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    So, with all of that,
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    I've just found myself recognizing more
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    and more the benefits of a government
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    that supports their citizens.
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    Like, actually supports their people.
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    People in Germany aren't in debt.
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    But here in the US,
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    I see friends living here
    who have more than one job
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    just to make ends meet,
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    and I realize that I'm angry about debt,
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    I'm angry that people are living
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    like this because I'm not.
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    I think about my family, my friends,
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    my future, and I'm worried.
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    [indistinct chatter]
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    - I was so
    happy to hear from you.
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    Of course I had to call.
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    And I think all my friends
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    are coming in next week to see your work.
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    - [interpreter VO] A perk of being a member
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    of the deaf community is that you
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    have this shared culture,
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    this shared language.
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    And so people like to stay there.
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    They don't want to be oppressed
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    in the way that they are
    in the hearing community.
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    But you kind of get trapped.
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    Sometimes you get
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    stuck in that echo,
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    and I was there for a while.
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    But then, I became an artist,
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    and I had to go into
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    the hearing world.
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    ♪uplifting synth music♪
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    I'm always a little bit
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    jealous of artists who have
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    the privilege to be misunderstood.
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    For me, I automatically feel
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    like I need to explain what things mean.
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    I have to say, "No, it's
    not this, it's that."
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    And I think that stems
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    from a place of how misunderstandings
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    can affect my rights,
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    all these little things in my daily life,
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    as well as navigating access,
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    education, entertainment, family.
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    Growing up, I loved art,
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    but I didn't really take
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    classes 'cause there weren't
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    interpreters available.
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    ♪tender music♪
    I remember when I was in high school,
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    there was a sculpture class that
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    I wanted to take that
    I thought was perfect.
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    I wanted to work with my hands.
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    They said no.
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    Then, as an undergrad
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    majoring in graphic design,
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    they had a night class
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    that I wanted to take.
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    They said no.
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    So it was interesting.
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    At that time, I kept getting told no.
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    And then when I grew up
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    and moved to New York,
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    it was super crowded,
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    and there was hearing people everywhere,
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    which wasn't my experience
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    growing up in California.
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    And so I had to figure out how
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    to constantly communicate with
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    these hearing people.
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    And people were just in my face,
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    and I was in people's faces.
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    Because of that, I just
    had less fear around it.
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    ♪uplifting music♪
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    And what I've realized is that
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    New York gave me the
    skills to navigate through
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    the world fearlessly.
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    [mechanical whirring]
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    When Hitomi, the curator
    here at Queens Museum,
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    reached out to me and we were
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    corresponding back and forth,
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    I thought, "How could I come up
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    "with an idea without actually
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    "physically visiting the Queens Museum?"
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    [indistinct chatter]
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    And in her correspondence,
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    she mentioned that Queens
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    was the epicenter of COVID for a while,
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    and that really struck
    me and got me thinking.
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    [honking]
    [siren]
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    I thought about rest.
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    I'm also seeing people being
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    overworked during the pandemic,
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    without maybe having health insurance.
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    ♪soft pensive music♪
    Lately, I've been into motion lines.
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    ♪♪♪
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    You can find those in
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    comic strips or comic books.
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    And I thought they were
    a perfect reflection
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    of sign language, and how it carries
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    a lot of weight and emotion.
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    For example, the sign for "time."
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    I tap my wrist with my index finger.
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    I looked at a bunch of different
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    signs that come into contact
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    with the body,
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    and I came up with a one-line poem
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    to fit the current climate
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    and what was happening in this area.
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    "Time owes me rest again."
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    ♪♪♪
    - [woman] Yeah, maybe you
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    can shave a little bit.
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    Yeah, bottom, bottom part.
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    - [interpreter VO] This experience
    made me think I can
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    work with such a large scale.
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    I thought a lot about that.
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    And it felt right that maybe
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    this is the best way where we
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    can shove or force our deafness
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    or our existence
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    or our deaf voice,
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    and do that in their everyday lives,
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    in their everyday space.
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    And it happened that the
    Manchester International Festival
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    reached out to me
    wanting to work together,
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    saying that I could
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    show any work I wanted.
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    And I was like, "All right,
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    "let me aim for the
    biggest thing I can do."
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    I said, "Let's caption the city."
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    ♪♪♪
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    I want people to see captions,
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    to think about why they're there,
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    to think about who might want them.
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    "Oh, yeah!
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    "Deaf people."
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    My favorite one is this
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    'cause I wanted it all, I wanted more.
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    I was like, "Let's caption
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    "the sky and get a plane."
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    ♪♪♪
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    And doing all that work has
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    given me the realization that
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    scale equals visibility,
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    and that has the ability
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    to shape social norms.
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    I want deaf lives to be in your mind,
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    and be part of what we
    consider acceptable,
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    what's normal.
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    ♪uplifting music♪
    If you don't see us,
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    we have no place to be,
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    and I think that's why
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    I've gotten into scale,
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    and also, I'm just greedy, too.
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    [crowd laughing]
    ♪ethereal ambient music♪
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    ♪♪♪
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    Hello, my name is Azikiwe Mohammed.
  • 13:43 - 13:50
    I am happy to have been featured by 
    Art21 in their series New York Close Up.
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    As you may or may not have seen, 
    I do a lot of different stuff,
  • 13:54 - 14:00
    and trying to explain it to people 
    can be a little chewy sometimes.
  • 14:00 - 14:03
    Now, I can say I make a lot 
    of stuff and then point them
  • 14:03 - 14:04
    somewhere.
  • 14:04 - 14:08
    That is all thanks to Art21.
  • 14:08 - 14:11
    If you like watching people make some stuff,
  • 14:11 - 14:18
    Art21 is an unlimited 24/7 resource of all 
    kinds of stuff from all different people.
  • 14:18 - 14:22
    There's educational resources, 
    engaging public programs,
  • 14:22 - 14:27
    and workshops for teachers that can 
    help bring art into the classroom,
  • 14:27 - 14:28
    which, very often,
  • 14:28 - 14:31
    is a burden left on the teachers.
  • 14:31 - 14:35
    But Art21 helps lift that burden by letting us,
  • 14:35 - 14:37
    the people who make some of the stuff,
  • 14:37 - 14:40
    bring some of the stuff into the classroom
  • 14:40 - 14:44
    via the films and resources that Art21 provides
  • 14:44 - 14:46
    free of charge.
  • 14:46 - 14:51
    Art is limitless, and Art21 is for everyone.
  • 14:51 - 14:55
    Please consider giving to Art21 
    to help make the stuff that
  • 14:55 - 14:57
    we make through Art21
  • 14:57 - 15:03
    available for free to everybody 
    for years and years to come.
  • 15:03 - 15:04
    Thank you.
Title:
Christine Sun Kim in “Friends & Strangers” - Season 11 | Art21
Description:

more » « less
Video Language:
English
Team:
Art21
Project:
"Art in the Twenty-First Century" broadcast series
Duration:
15:18

English subtitles

Revisions