In spring 2009 I started a long term photographic research on garage sales. I've been collecting a wide array of objects, found or purchased at fleamarkets, garage sales, through eBay, etc. These items can be viewed as agents for a fictitious and temporary owner. I envision a baby boomer born in the United States. Garage sales are part of a do-it-yourself-culture, where people help themselves and create a parallel economy. My work traces this otherwise unmapped trade and reflects on the ever-changing value of objects under given circumstances. I create a document of every item before letting it re-enter the commodity circuit through my own garage sales/exhibitions, using a scanner or a camera. As the project progresses, other materials such as sales receipts, invitation cards, polaroids, texts and more documents are added to create a snowball effect. Each garage sale generates new material for an ever-growing image database.
Within the framework of this project, I travelled to the United States and visited the worlds longest yard sale, also known as the 127 Corridor Sale, that runs through the states of Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and Alabama. I purchased about 120 objects and photographed each one of them in a locally chosen setting. 72 of these photographs form the series entitled "127 - Imagine a golden piggy bank with no one to spare a dime".