I met Bradley McCallum several years ago in Seattle. We had both been selected to be a part of Arts Up Seattle, an ambitious public art program where artists were invited to come and work with community organizations and groups on long term projects. Bradley's project ended up being one of the best. He worked with a shelter for homeless youths. They made a performance and video that is terrific. I will post more about that later. I had forgotten until yesterday that he also made these carts in collaboration with unhoused folks living in Richmond, Virginia, in the late 1980s.



Homeless Carts, 1988-89
Public, civic performative sculpture, Richmond, VA

Bradley McCallum in collaboration with its user designed 11 vehicles given to individuals who collected aluminum cans and other materials for recycling. John Henderson returned his cart on June 5, 1989 after he was diagnosed with cancer and no longer had the physical strength to continue collecting cans. The other carts remained the property of the individuals who used them -- resulting in an ongoing public installation that sustained a visible presence in Richmond for several years.

On his daily bike-commute to work, Alexis Petroff has spent several years taking photos of shopping carts used by unhoused people to collect scrap metal and other recyclable material. These photos tend to aestheticize the carts and detach them a bit from the people who made the collections, but nonetheless, they are very compelling and Petroff takes care in being respectful when taking these images.

I was in New York a couple years ago, walking around the East Village, and saw a very tall, muscular man with long dreadlocks, shirt off, pulling about 7 shopping carts, each filled to twice the height of the carts with various materials. I was tempted to take my own photo until I saw a woman who had the same idea and was berated for her blatant tourist voyeurism. The man stopped what he was doing and started screaming at the woman, "I am not a fucking sideshow!" Classic NY encounter. She should have just asked him, maybe even given him a few bucks for the privilege of documenting his spectacular display. It was truly beautiful and much more engaging than most of the art work that I had just looked at in fancy Soho and Chelsea galleries.

Here is a link to Alexis's really nice images:

http://www.temporaryservices.org/carts/alexis_carts.html


This is an artist book that Alexis made from selected images of the shopping carts.