About this project

What leads people to throw things away?

Living in Detroit, I often wonder at the rationale we use to assign value to objects and places. Things we want so much when we first see them, save and spend to possess, and eventually come to disregard and abandon. Things like couches. Things like Detroit. Is it possible some of these things are still useful?

I am in the process of creating a calendar of 12 Detroit landscapes, each featuring a discarded or abandoned couch. To you, it may signify the apocalyptic tidings of an empty city, but for some people, Detroit allows a great deal of freedom for reinvention. Municipal services are limited to the point where an abandoned couch might sit on the street for a month or more, maybe even long enough for someone to see it not as trash, but art.

The work of collecting images is ongoing, and you can see some b-sides and extras here. It is my intention to produce the calendar for release in September. The cost of production is greatly reduced if I order in bulk; the goal of this project is to secure enough pre-orders to allow me to do so. 500, to be exact.

In the interest of combining social change with personal artistic growth, I will donate 10% of my funds raised to the Shipherd Greens Community Garden, to help them further their efforts to make the West Village a thriving, productive and beautiful neighborhood.