The Garbage Can Project
The Garbage Can Project is a web-based project documenting my gabage carts between December 2005 and March 2008. During that period, the website was uploaded daily so that viewers could follow the project as it unfolded. The idea for the Garbage Can Project came from the frequent theft of the city-issued garbage carts that are in front of my apartment building. Each time the carts were stolen, I would call the City of Chicago and they would eventually bring more carts to replace them. After months of observing this cycle, I became interested in the phenomenon of the garbage cart thefts.
The Project officially began in December 2005, when I began keeping a daily photo diary of the garbage carts documenting their number, position, and any additional objects placed on or near them. Between December 2005 and March 2008, eleven garbage carts were stolen and replaced by the city.
In October 2006, I began filming the garbage carts twenty-four hours a day. Each day I viewed the footage from the previous day, creating digital video clips of any instances of people interacting with the carts. The surveillance cameras have captured not only the expected usage of garbage cans - building tenants taking out their trash, local dog walkers, passers by throwing away their soda bottles – but also such unexpected episodes as a hat that someone placed on the garbage carts which several passing strangers decided to try on, or the coffee cup a man left on top of the cart, which was later picked up and drunk by a well dressed businessman walking past. And of course there are the garbage cart thefts. I still have no idea why people kept stealing our garbage carts, or what possible use they had for them.
CLICK HERE TO VISIT WWW.THEGARBAGECANPROJECT.COM