I've been advised that Parreno's marquee pieces deserve further discussion. They are, certainly, the dominant visual element of the H{N)Y P N(Y}OSIS installation at the Park Avenue Armory, marking the outline of Danny the Street and providing much of the illumination in the Drill Hall. The films and musical interludes might alternate, turning on and off in random sequence, but the marquees abide like sentinels or referees, providing strict framing of the playing field, defining the rules of the game.

When the circus comes to town, we are accustomed to a certain hierarchy of presentation. First there is the sideshow, often an allee lined with various attractions that are transitory and ephemeral: small, spicy, tender morsels that serve to whet our appetite for the main course, where the real business of the circus -- marching elephants, dancing bears, lion tamers, jugglers, tightrope walkers, aerial acts, the flying trapeze and such -- gets done under the Big Top.