title: Signs series
date: 1997-2001
medium: colour photographs mounted on PVC panels

A series of multi-panel photographic works based on colour images of single words photographed from public signage. Each piece assembles together several of these units to form not-quite-sensical mottos and terse concrete poems reminiscent of the clichés and turns of phrase we use in our everyday interpersonal relations. They rely equally on plays of visual form and often-ungrammatical wording, lightly skewing the familiar by combining the longings built into both commercial signage and everyday speech.  

A series made by blocking out words from pre-printed signs using pieces of self-adhesive vinyl, in order perhaps to isolate the underlying sentiments behind these standard communications. For example, "Sorry, we're closed" becomes the simple and abject "Sorry", or a series of prohibition signs becomes the litany "NO NO NO", or "HELP WANTED" devolves into a desperate call for "HELP". These are installed in out-of-the-way spots of the room, as these types of sign usually are.

The refrain from Edgar Allan Poe's poem applied to a wind-spun metal sign repeats an eerie mantra of perpetual loss.