Iraqi American artist Vian Sora employs abstraction to understand the constant refusal, mourning, and renegotiations of identity—an ever-present and evolving process of becoming. In Last Sound, Sora charged this painting with dark stains and clashing surface textures, disrupting passages with vibrant hues of pigment. Alluding in its title to the belief that the memories of the last familiar sound of one’s past life continue to resonate and emerge in the present, Sora’s gestural and material fusion and divergence echo the spectrum of displaced experiences. Sora modeled her technique after the ancient Mesopotamian mural paintings and relief traditions of her own cultural heritage, using oils, dry pigments, dyes, and thinning solvents to create leather-like textures.