Burning Man 2007
September 5th, 2007What the Heck is Burning Man?
Burning Man is a 7-day festival in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada that encourages radical forms of self-expression. This year, 45,000 souls arrived on the flat lake bed (known as the “Playa”) to set up a temporary city (known as “Black Rock City”) - complete with roads, street lamps, and other basic public services. The city is traditionally arranged in a huge semi-circle with the effigy of the Man in the center and numerous art installations in the surrounding space.
A section of Burning Man’s main street - The Esplanade.
Mega-Art
Nothing beats the scale of the Burning Man installation art. The 2007 event sported a ten-story wooden oil derrick and four-story human figures welded from metal scrap.
Bow down to the tiny flesh beings and their firey ways!
A pair of full-size, semi-truck, oil tankers were bent into a giant S. Of course, there were numerous smaller pieces spread throughout the Playa. Although the Burning Man non-profit wing does provide a limited number of grants to artists, the majority of the art installations are created for the sheer joy of the artistic process.
Nice job parking.
Participation
Burning Man is all about participation. It is not about idle viewing. You install art, you create new art on the spot, you perform, you provide services to other Burners, or you help run Black Rock City.
Fashionable fine mud.
This year, I painted Playa mud portraits of my neighbors. I also applied body paint to those wishing to spice up exposed flesh.
Belly flames.
I fulfilled my civic duty by becoming a Lamplighter carrier. The Lamplighter camp is a sacred institution started in 1994. Its volunteer members literally light the oil lamps that hang from all the lamp posts along all the main streets each and every night. The mere sight of a Lamplighter procession brings cheers and yells of “I love you, Lamplighters!” A strange tradition, but an honored tradition nonetheless.
The author prepares to hoist a petard of 12 lamps.
Spontaneous Gatherings
The Playa gives rise to many spontaneous gatherings for no other purpose than for the sheer fun of it all. For instance, the Earth’s largest light saber battle took place around the foot of the Man with hundreds slicing and dicing with gifted sabers. Other gatherings involves nudity on bikes, games of ruleless “Calvinball,” and ubiquitous drum circles.
Sith this, sucker!
Habitation
The Playa, before the event starts, is absolutely empty. Thus, you have to bring your own shelter. Although many stick with good, old-fashioned tents, RVs, Winnebagos, and million-dollar luxury buses are driven in. Better yet, many Burners construct their own buildings. Homemade geodesic domes, parachutes lashed to PVC pipe framework, and converted Costco carports are but a few variations. Clever art intsallations doubled as abodes; these included a steel tree house and a two-story San Francisco flat that could be driven around on a giant set of geared wheels. Apart from the each Burner’s shelter of choice, shade structures are a must. One must have a place to doze during the heat of the day.
Dust proof, but only when you remember to close the door.
Extreme Engineering
The majority of Burners are from the Bay Area. Many of these people work in Silicon Valley. Therefore, it’s no accident that amazing engineering skills are put to use in Black Rock City. Case in point: An animatronic chimpanzee plays you a game of Simon in a downed space capsule.
You lost, sucka’. Get out before I Sputnik ya’.
Case in point: A three-dimensional array of diode “light bulbs” shifts through a gorgeous array of colors and spins three-dimensional images.
Better than a lousy “Dream Machine.”
Case in point: Somebody brought their eight-legged, robotic, walking spider one-seater. Not to be outdone, one camp built a wood-chip-fueled, hydrogen-powered, “gasser” car/sled on location. Never mind the dizzying array of moving machinery belting out fire, flame, and theatric explosions.
Bike It
Burning Man is monstorous. To trek from one end of the semi-circle to the other or from Center Camp to the furthest art installation, you need a bike or risk exhaustion from walking hours upon hours. Just don’t bring a nice bike. The alkaline dust of the Playa chews up machinery. The rear hub of my own bike failed on Sunday.
Donate your old bike? It’ll make a swell sculpture the next year.
Art Cars
Not into bike riding or walking? Build, transport, and register an art car. There were dozens of examples in 2007, ranging from wheeled bars, to mobile DJ dance stations, to powered La-Z-Boy chairs, to twisted Macy Day floats, to golf carts disguised as surreal creatures, to Steam Punk Victorian-Industrial vehicles, to “Mad Max” styled death-mobiles. Many of the art cars were equipped monster stereo systems and flame cannons. ‘Cause, you know, flame cannons are a basic safety feature on the Playa.
A mobile ultra-lounge awaits nightfall.
Who needs a parade when you have a float like this?
Background: Prayer Temple; Foreground: Dead cow car
These gennies mean business.
A DJ station makes a run for it.
If you wanna’ dance, you have to give chase.
Playa Dress Code
Speaking of “Mad Max,” if there was a Burning Man style of dress, it would parallel “Beyond Thunderdome.” Platform boots, furry leg coverings, dreaded and colored hair, goggles, dust masks, bikini tops, and all manner of trinkets, pouches, and bags. That said, you can dress however you like. It’s all good and nobody will care one way or another. Some Burners choose a wide range of fantastic, home-made costumes. Some choose desert survival gear. Some choose to go without clothes, or to reduce clothing to a minimum. Lingerie is popular. Wigs and strange hats are common. Many women look like sexy Anime characters. At one point, I saw a man in a full-body chicken suit. It seemed quite normal. As for the Thunderdome, there is one at Burning Man. It’s run by the Death Guild, and they hold “Death” matches on giant bungie cords - just like the movie.
Members of the Bunny camp and the Animal Control camp
watch their compatriots duke it out in the Thunderdome.
Nature Gives No Quarter
The Black Rock Desert is harsh. To makes things more tricky, the weather varies wildly from year to year. For 2007, it was close to 110 degrees in the day with brutal, white-out dust storms each afternoon. (Hence, the popularity of goggles and dust masks, which had to be close by at all times.) Once a storm hits, you had to stop in your tracks and take whatever cover is nearby. Since the dust blown by the wind is super-fine, it works its way into everything, including your ears, eyes, nose, tent and car. I arrived at Burning Man Thursday morning and was able to enjoy 5 or 6 white-outs. If I had arrived on Monday, I would no doubt have looked like Lawrence of Arabia at the end of his campaign. Fortunately, it was always a lovely, calm 60 degrees at night. And the nighttime is when most of the fun happens.
A metal sculpture braces for the worst.
Facilities
So where do you, ahem, take care of business in Black Rock City? Why, lines of Johnny-on-the-Spot Port-a-Pottys. Hundreds upons hundreds of the things placed strategically along the street and fairways. Surprisingly tidy this tear.
Foreground: Hug Deli (I recommend the Bear Hug)
Background: Green Johnnys flanked by blue handicapped Johnnys
And the Man Burns?
And how. If there’s one thing the organizers of Burning Man appreciate, it’s fire. For the last few years, the man has burned on Saturday night. You arrive at the safety ring around sunset (if you get too close you risk melting). An hour on two later, there’s a massive fire show with hundreds of fire performers juggling, blowing, twirling flaming torches, batons, and the like. The flaming hula hoop brigade was particularly cool, twirling the unforgiving steel around their necks!
Smokin’ - literally.
Once the fire show subsides, the Man raises his arms and a stellar fire works display goes off. At some point, there are a few huge explosions and the Man begins to burn. As soon as the Man falls to the ground, you can run to his side, where you circle the inferno (for some reason, always in a counter-clockwise fashion). This year, the man was built too tough, so he must have taken a half hour to finally plummet to the ground. And, with 20,000 or so Burners circling his remains, it got a little crowded. It was a bit scary to be on the front line of the mob. To your left, firemen in silver body suits and a brutally hot flames. To your right, a crush or Burning Man humanity. I’m surprised nobody was trampled…
So goes the Man.
The Future
One of Burning Man’s biggest challenges is its own popularity. The tickets are several hundred dollars, it’s in the middle of nowhere in a unforgiving desert, and yet the event grows each year. In 1997, the first year I attended, it had grown to a horribly large size of 10,000. Now it’s approaching 50,000. The event is still true to its basic roots, but it’s in danger of becoming impractical. Can Black Rock City be enlarged? Are there enough artists and participators to make it a worthwhile happening? Is Burning Man truly becoming a Disneyland for naughty adults? Are there enough port-a-potty’s in the entire state of Nevada? Only time will tell…and I’ll find out myself next year….
I’m going to Disnylan - er, I mean, Burning Man!
2008, baby. The man won’t burn without me…
Ice exodus.
