A found roadside banner, once stretched illegally across a freeway bridge, now hangs inside the gallery.

It originally read HAPPY 18TH BILLY, hand drawn in thick black marker and fastened with heavy cable ties. Driving beneath it, I spoke aloud without thinking, Happy Breathday Billy. The word arrived unexpectedly. It would not leave me alone.

I returned for the banner a week later, making sure “Billy” had witnessed his Happy Birthday Banner.

Breathday marks not just the day of birth, but the first breath. In Hebrew, ruach means both breath and spirit, the same word used for the breath of God moving over the waters, and the breath that animates Adam from clay.

BREATHDAY, rendered in gothic print on cotton, is cut and glued to the banner. The act elevates and alters the message, folding a new layer and meaning into its history.