In a city that’s seen everything, one artistic stunt weirds people out more than ever – a human carpet you might step on without even realizing.
A man who goes by the name of “Kevin Carpet” has been lying under carpets since the 1980s, but it’s only recently that the internet has rediscovered him.
A viral TikTok video with almost 300,000 likes shows Kevin blocking the sidewalk as confused passers-by do a double-take to see what’s going on.
User Taylor Pare posted a video explaining that Kevin has been doing the rounds for “literal years,” calling it alarming because someone could trip.
Pare goes one step further by saying that if it’s a fetish, then that should be disclosed between all parties.
@paretay BYOC #nyc #foryou #storytime ♬ original sound - Taylor Paré
When we dug a bit deeper, Cybernews found that in a follow-up video, Pare alleges Kevin is a trust-fund kid, whose father was a major Universal Music executive – and that Kevin is “rolled up in dough and carpets.”
The public seems divided on whether Kevin’s stunts are artistic, a creepy perversion of being stepped on, or just harmless fun.
From watching a couple of videos he’s tagged in, it appears Kevin’s been part of the NYC gig scene since the ’80s. There’s even a clip from 2022 tagging him at a concert.
Digging deeper, in a 2022 interview with The Cut, Kevin described his carpet act as “interactive art” and compared being walked on to “massage therapy.” One quip included him saying, “I get more action on the floor than most people do standing up.”
Whether it’s performance art or shock value, Kevin the Carpet is part of the NYC lineage of street performers doing weird or confrontational stuff.
Anyone who’s walked the streets of New York – especially at night – can tell you: there are plenty of weird and wonderful characters lingering around.
As TikTok’s virality recontextualizes these obscure individuals, Kevin is certainly stirring up a reaction among Gen Z. Just don’t forget to add a dash of context.
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