A hand lettered text drawing. Points to both Russian constructivist graphic design and the northwest coast native american habit of putting color on wood. Decidedly enigmatic, a sign for nothing really, this piece reverberates with word and image associations: "the river Dance," Russian circus bears, "gay bear" culture (including dancing) around the Russian river, the image of bears hunting salmon, salmon and rivers in northwest native culture, dancing and animal totems in native culture...

  The piece is meant to look like a circus banner, a side show sign. I'm using a compass and a ruler to construct type faces that pay homage to all hand constructed signage from Rome to the Russian avant guarde. I copied type faces from old books, made a scale drawing of the piece, gridded out the canvas and transfered the drawing. Then it's a matter of "coloring in" the shapes of the letters...