Mel Bochner "BLAH, BLAH, BLAH," 2013 (Click arrows for more images) On main billboard, in Hatton, Missouri, June–July 2014
"BLAH, BLAH, BLAH" on main billboard site (click arrows for more images)
Mel Bochner, "BLAH, BLAH, BLAH," 2013 (click arrows for more images) On satellite billboard in Warrenton, Missouri, August–September 2015
View of Bochner billboard with housing development (click arrows for more images)
A pioneer of conceptual art, Mel Bochner has since the 1960s questioned the clarity, function, and efficacy of language. Within the Sign Show, "BLAH BLAH BLAH" offered a direct and playful critique of Missouri’s surplus billboards, three times more than neighboring states and five times the national average. Along I-70, the hundreds of messages blend together in a numbing barrage. Many unrented signs are blank. Others declare their self-evident purpose with ads for ad space. When the Bochner work moved, its new spot adjacent to a housing development and nearby a Walmart slanted its meaning toward the generic, in architecture and commerce as well as language.