Trash From Immigrants Inspires Custodian’s Art

During Tom Kiefer’s decade spent as a custodian at a U.S. border station in Arizona, like all cleaners, he regularly emptied the trash. However, unlike most custodians, he found treasure in that trash that inspired him to create art.

That exhibit, El Sueno Americano/The American Dream, is on display at Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles until March, Channel News Asia reports. It features more than 100 photographs Kiefer took of the discarded items. From a distance many of the photographs look like abstract modern art. But upon closer inspection, viewers realize they are looking at everyday items, meticulously arranged and photographed against colored backgrounds.

One photograph shows dozens of syringes and cartons containing pills and ointments laid out against a bright yellow canvas. Another shows about 50 toothbrushes—some worn and filthy—arranged on a blue background. A third depicts cell phones of various shapes and sizes showing technology between 2003 and 2014.

One visitor, an immigrant herself, described the artwork as emotional because she recalled how she and other people traveling to the United States from Mexico left behind their everyday items, not knowing if they were ever coming back to their birthplace.