"Where did YOU go?"

This text installation was an idea that came to me after having to paint over another text installation. After several coats of white, I could still see the tracings of my original work, so I began to work with the idea of this figurative sense of permanance- in terms of covering something up, or making something disappear. Even when you paint over another color, or stain on your wall- you still know it is there. It shows somehow, even if only by the heavily saturated single clean paint spot standing out on the dusty white surface of the wall.
This invincible presence is being used somewhat obviously in the first installation of the piece, and was titled in a simple punch line fashion; "Where did YOU go?"
I began to consider semiotic perception, and where and how a viewer would take the notion of "You" being erased somehow; mainly, where they might put themselves in this simple contradiction. I personaly, was creating a very intimate narrative in a sense- I was considering the notion of making someone in my life dissapear in the same way as a stain, and than, almost the childish notion of asking them 'where did you go?' being almost reminiscent of peek-a-boo as a kid. When the piece was re-installed for the "Verify" exhibition at MIAD, I used a more subtle, yet provocative approach by doing two things.
One, I painted almost entirely over the "YOU," in hopes to extend the concept by leaving the almost decorative painterly qualities of the original behind, and leaving some viewers questioning a nearly blank wall (most were either confused or annoyed). Second, as the title provides you with the only concrete notion of this peculiar joke ("Where did YOU go"?) I signed my name as Joseph R. Reeves ESQ, and put 22,000 dollars as the price.