The Resilience of King Khazm

Project

Elliat directed The Resilience of King Khazm in 2018, produced through the Fly Film Challenge of Seattle International Film Festival and Washington Film Works.

King Khazm is a beatmaker, community organizer, and staple of the Seattle Hip Hop community… with a personal and family story that exemplifies resilience against all odds.

The history that contextualizes Khazm spans from his grandparents being put in Japanese Internment Camps during WWII, hosting the 50th anniversary for the Seattle Black Panthers as manager for historic Washington Hall, to his own personal history of becoming wheelchair bound as a child. As a community organizer and artist of various mediums rooted in hip hop, he co-directs 206 Zulu with Kitty Wu and holds space for youth arts programming that interrupts cycles of incarceration. As a young person who grew up in Seattle’s Beacon Hill around both gang culture and his rich family histories, Khazm is connected to so many stories that circle back a culture and tradition of resilience that deserves our attention and praise.

SCREENINGS: