This project was inspired by the trash bags stacked up on every street throughout New York City. Walking by these huge, overflowing piles every week, a person can’t help but question how people can create so much “trash”. Also, a person with a vivid imagination, such as myself, cannot help but daydream about these piles of trash taking on a life of their own. To try to help other people imagine just that, I took the iconic eyeballs of Sesame Street’s Big Bird and stuck them on piles of trash throughout New York City.
The project evolved into this series of photographs after more and more questions kept popping into my mind. Questions I needed to ask myself and others. Can we imagine a different potential for these piles of bags? Why do we assume it is trash? Where else do we make similar assumptions in our lives? How is this perspective related to privilege in society? With these questions, observing the reactions of children to the project and reflecting on my previous work as an art teacher in a low income housing development in Seattle, I decided to document the project with a series of photographs taken in NYCHA housing developments throughout Brooklyn and Queens.
