While in Mexico I was heavily influenced by the hand painted advertising and signage - all around you, especially in the older districts you find these beautifully crafted, hand painted shop signs. The thing that I found interesting about these was the individuality and the freedom of style. It appeared that the sign writers painting them weren't following any rule books - something which would be considered a mistake over here looked perfect and seemed to work in the colouful and vibrant surroundings. I left Mexico with some great ideas and new ways to continue my typographic mission. Also on my mind was Sickboy's forthcoming show at White Walls Gallery. I'm hopefully going to be in San Francisco at the time of his show and I've been thinking about collaborating on a large wall with him. With this in mind I'd been sketching some ideas, when I was given the opportunity to paint this wall on Brannah and 6th. The wall itself is not ideal; two grilled windows and a large shutter break it up. I couldn't make one word or phrase fit around these obstacles so the best way to make this work seemed to be to paint 3 separate words on the larger sections of the wall. I started with Sickness on the first day, combining two letter styles and breaking the word up into its individual syllables, making the word fit the space comfortably. Day 2, with two more sections still to paint and happy with the way Sickness had come out, I wanted to continue with that theme. So I started thinking about 4 letter words that worked with a 'less' or a 'ness'. There are some funny ones out there, but after hearing Sam's (landlord of the building) life story 'Hopeless' and 'Loveless' were the most appropriate.
Thanks to Dscreet Ben for coming down and filming the action