ACT10: tracing trash

Tracing Trash is the 2010 iteration of ArtCraftTech [ACT]. ACT is a program of Culture Push, a NYC-based
organization that fosters participatory cross-disciplinary projects. ACT an annual short-term problem-solving
conference that creates a dialogue between several creative disciplines, bringing together artists,
craftspeople, scientists, and technology experts to work on a problem outside their field of expertise in a
spirit of open inquiry and inviting input and feedback from the public. ACT offers the interdisciplinary team
the freedom to be as creative and imaginative as they want to be, and then brings a general public into the
process. Through a series of linked live and web-based public events and conversations, ACT10: Tracing
Trash is exploring and exposing the hidden web of the food system: following the decaying, the disposable,
and the derivative among others. ACT10 is planned and executed by Clarinda Mac Low, Elliott Maltby,
Babette Audant, Sara Eichner, Deena Patel, Neha Sabnis, Jill Slater, and Kathy Westwater.

trash, waste, mongo, excess

The Tracing Trash group began their initial wide-ranging conversation with two broad concepts: food justice
and urban land use. Descriptions of Fresh Kills, waste transfer station locations, guerrilla compost
strategies, statistics about discarded food, and the politics of smell indicated a shared fascination with the
waste currently inherent in the urban food system. As food cycles through the city on its path to
consumption, it collects waste [wrapping, packaging, transit] and becomes waste: peelings, leftovers, table
scraps, wishful thoughts. The origin of food has captured the popular imagination [as the ubiquity of urban
agriculture conferences attests] – what if we interrupted and studied the shadowy actions of loss, removal
and decay? The ACT10 participants became determined to submit food’s trashy end to a close and
imaginative inspection.

rather than waste waste, contemplate it, capture it, expose it. challenge it

Can an excavation of trash reveal how New Yorkers understand this hidden social and physical
infrastructure? Could plucking trash temporarily from the waste stream serve as a catalyst for new ways of
understanding or even minimizing that stream? As the conversations continued, ACT10 focused more
precisely on several facets of the waste stream and how these facets might be exposed. Five linked
components of Tracing Trash are in development, as detailed below. In addition, a gallery event will take
place in early February, 2011, to examine and synthesize the results of the various components. Progress
of all the components are available online at www.culturepush.org or act10nyc.blogspot.com

talking trash
Talking Trash is the first public research action of Tracing Trash: over the course of four weekends in Fall
2010 we did some serious trash talking with the public. In addition to gathering the concerns, questions,
thoughts and frustrations of people who stopped to talk to us, we also collected and curated trash given to
us by friends and strangers in McCarren Park and Union Square. [The collected trash will be used on the
trash vitrine; see below] By positioning ourselves near farmers’ markets and composting drop-off locations
we consciously situated our trash collection within a food narrative – we saw it as a sort of reverse CSA.
The second iteration of Talking Trash will be collecting trash from the sidewalks and streets of our own
neighborhoods.

n-dtgc [non-disposable to go container]

Can the re-design of the familiar to go container challenge our reliance on and acceptance of the
disposable? As ACT10 started talking more about the n-dtgc, it became apparent how omnipresent the
disposable container is in the city landscape, and how the solution involves much more than re-thinking the
object. Currently a prototype is being developed, along with alternative distribution system scenarios.
ACT10 members and other interested participants will be testing the prototype at a range of restaurants that
rely on disposable containers.
ACT10: tracing trash

Total number of food containers in a given system must stay constant, they can only be transferred from
one user to another. - Tracing Trash’s Law of Conservation of Food Containers [This hypothesis is
supported by the joint effort of the n-dtgc and its distribution network, as a part of generating a Disposable
Container Free Society.]

guerrilla composting
There are a few really fantastic compost collection locations throughout the city – but far too few and in
some cases, not terribly convenient. What is a good composter to do? ACT10 is preparing a short video
showing how to guerrilla compost!

trash vitrine
The trash collection aspect of Tracing Trash looks for patterns of day to day life revealed in stratified layers
of garbage collected over time. Sorting and formalizing collected garbage in clear vitrines takes sorting our
trash to a level beyond the rituals of separating plastic from glass from compost, and reconsiders the results
of daily consumption.

deriva-trivia
DERIVA-TRIVIA, two simultaneous, intersecting monologues by ACT 2010 members Deena Patel and
Kathy Westwater, explores the role of derivatives and commodities in the trajectory of trash before
consumption -- it’s the “trashy” prequel to the trash. What you always wanted to know about derivatives and
commodities but were afraid to ask… ACT 2010 asks for you, and attempts to answer.