Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s wedding was a little over a week ago, and while the event was mostly shrouded in mystery thanks to extensive NDAs and blocked windows, fans still gathered outside the blockade cutting off the streets surrounding Madison Square Garden for a chance to catch a glimpse of the event or its attendees. Two of the most famous people in America cutting off the streets of New York City and then putting “JUST&T MARRIED” on billboards outside while fans cheer from a block away is dystopian enough, but now, it appears fans are paying actual money for pieces of trash from the event.
Justin Gignac, an artist who runs New York City Garbage, which makes art pieces out of litter found around the city, has already sold out of the 50 “NYC Pocket Garbage: Not Invited Edition” pieces which included scraps from around the wedding including “cigarette butts, water bottle caps, caution tape, pieces of a rainbow fan, straws, utensils, an ovulation test kit, a ring pop, and one left AirPod.” Notably, these aren’t necessarily pieces of trash from the actual wedding; they’re just from outside of Madison Square Garden where fans were gathered. So while some of this could be from a guest who was passing through the checkpoint, it’s probably more likely to have been something one of your fellow Swifties dropped while hanging around outside the arena during a heat wave.
There’s garbage on the floor after the party. Collected from the edge of a love story outside Madison Square Garden, as close to Taylor & Travis’ big day as you could’ve gotten without an invite. This is the debut of Pocket Garbage, so you can carry a piece of the greatest day of your… I mean, their lives, wherever you go.
The Not Invited Edition pieces were sold for $25 a pop, and are encased in a one-inch cube signed by Gignac. This is cheaper than other garbage he has sold on his website, with some (also sold-out) pieces selling for more than $100. As an art concept, I get New York City Garbage and think it’s actually pretty cool. A piece of trash was at one point something of use, and that tells a story, however mundane, when encased in a plastic box. I think the reason this particular project puts a bad taste in my mouth is because I also had the unfortunate pleasure of watching a video of Swifties eating leftovers from the wedding outside the venue.
The catering company at Swift and Kelce’s wedding brought food from the wedding out to fans outside Madison Square Garden and it’s just…I get viscerally uncomfortable watching people scramble around scraps from a billionaire’s wedding. Which, was I already in my feelings about people who flew all the way up to New York City in a heat wave to stand blocks away from the event? Sure. The whole public display of parasocial affection is kind of terrifying to watch when you’re not in it, but decades of stan culture and Swift’s tendency to write music that mythologizes her own love life have led us to this point.