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FRESH KILLS LANDFILL IS A WINDBLOWN LANDSCAPE on the western shore of Staten Island where for 53 years (1948-2001) New York City dumped all of its household trash and garbage, in the process transforming a pristine salt marsh along the Atlantic flyway into a virtual wasteland. At the height of dumping in 1986-87, barges were ferrying 29,000 tons of waste a day to Fresh Kills. The grassy, rolling hills of the landfillscape are capped mounds of trash ranging from 90 to 225 feet above sea level.
As seen in photographer Michael Falco's brilliant color photographs, Fresh Kills Landfill is revealed as a vast, open wetland with sweeping vistas back to the New York City skyline, as a gull-- infested dump mechanically tended by barges, tugs, cranes, trash haulers and compactors, and, most recently, as the final resting place of the mangled debris from ground zero. "Sanitation in New York City is a fascinating subject," insists Falco, who has been exhaustively photographing Fresh Kills Landfill for over two years. "All of the new technology about dumping garbage was created at Fresh Kills. Foreign dignitaries come to Fresh Kills to learn how we dispose of garbage."
Falco, 37, was born on Staten Island in 1965 and grew up five minutes from the Staten Island Ferry terminal. He is a local boy who has looked deeply at his native landscape.
Falco first took up photography in his junior year in college while pursuing an elementary education degree at the College of Staten Island. After graduation, he worked for eight years as a staff photographer on the Staten Island Advance. Then, in 1996, he received a commission that launched his...