The difference between graffiti and street art is raised in this French mixed media short film. A man is on a street in an urban area. He spray paints a trio of birds onto the wall, and is amazed when the birds take on a life of their own and fly around the murals and graffiti that adorn the concrete. Eventually, the other visual signs on the walls join in, in a celebration of art and freedom that challenges a normative understanding of what art is and what can art be. The countercultural, free-spirited vibe of this work will strike a chord with 12-15 year olds and provides a good stimulus for the creation of cultural artefacts in a classroom environment. The role of graffiti versus street art is sufficient in itself, but the symbolism of the film also provides a powerful means to consider freedom of movement, liberty, and how art can help us to express this. Another work in the corpus which uses, in a different way, the visuality of graffiti is خربشة [Scribble], a wordless picturebook by Palestinian artist Rina Hamed.
