The Personal Side of Dumpster Diving

According to the EPA, Americans generate 4.5 lbs of garbage per day or 251 million tons a year. Gregg Segal challenges us to think about our carbon footprint and the impact it has to our planet with his new series ‘7 Days of Garbage.’ In it, he captures images of friends, neighbors, and other acquaintances from varying socioeconomic backgrounds surrounded by the garbage they accumulate in a week. The thought-provoking images brings into perspective how much unnecessary trash Americans generate and how laying it all out there for everyone to see also tells a bit about each of his subjects. Perhaps another layer to the project is how each person’s trash is representative of who and where they are at in life such as the 2 guys surrounded by pizza boxes or the family of four surrounded by milk cartons and kiddie snacks. According to Segal, “Obviously, the series is guiding people toward a confrontation with the excess that’s part of their lives. I’m hoping they recognize a lot of the garbage they produce is unnecessary.”

For an article on how one artist turns excess into art, try A New Kind of Garbage Collecting: Edouard Martinet Turns Scraps Into Art.