[1][2] Located in a secluded square across from the French Embassy, the wall had love poems and short messages against the communist Czechoslovak government since the 1960s, but the first message connected to John Lennon was painted following the 1980 assassination of Lennon, when an unknown artist painted a single image of the singer-songwriter and some lyrics onto a stone slab foundation of a former public fountain.

Following a short-lived era of democratization and political liberalization known as the Prague Spring, the newly installed communist government dismantled the reforms, inspiring anger and resistance.

The liberalization movement these students followed was described as Lennonism (not to be confused with Leninism), and Czech authorities described participants variously as alcoholic, mentally deranged, sociopathic, and agents of Western free market capitalism.

[citation needed] After the fall of the iron curtain and replacement of the communist government the wall continuously underwent change and the original portrait of Lennon was long lost under layers of new paint and graffiti.

[8] On 22 April 2019, Earth Day, the environmentalist group Extinction Rebellion repainted the wall as a demand for the Czech government to act on climate change.

[9] In July 2019, artists painted a memorial on the wall for Hong Kong democracy activist Marco Leung Ling-kit, who became known as a martyr and a symbol of hope for the 2019 anti-extradition bill protest movement.

Inspired by the original in Prague, many thousands of people posted colourful post-it notes expressing democratic wishes for Hong Kong.

[20] Throughout several months of occupation and protest, many efforts were made by different groups to ensure physical and digital preservation of the Hong Kong Lennon Wall.

[31] Lennon Walls have also appeared outside of Hong Kong in Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Seoul, Tokyo, Berlin, London, Sydney, Manchester, Melbourne, Taipei, and Auckland.