“If you want someone to do something, I would not begin the sales pitch with, ‘It’s in the middle of the Nevada desert in August.’” – Jon Stewart
As unexcited as my favorite Mr. Stewart was about the prospect of spending a week at the Burning Man festival in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, about 50,000 people would vehemently disagree with him. Each year, “burners” of every age, class, nationality and profession make the trek to the harsh conditions of the desert to be part of an experimental community, which challenges its members to express themselves creatively and be completely self-reliant. What exactly is Burning Man? That’s the big question that lacks a succinct answer.
It’s been called Las Vegas on acid, a pagan festival, a Woodstock for the 21st century and the largest outdoor art exhibit in the world. In the most primitive of terms, Burning Man is a festival where tens of thousands of people come together to transform the barren desert into a fully functioning city, complete with an infrastructure, post office, movie theater and coffee shop. When the week is over, participants completely dismantle the city, following the festival’s “Leave No Trace” policy; the goal of which is to leave the area around them in better condition than before their arrival to ensure their participation does not have a long term impact on the environment.
Burning Man doesn’t have a single focus, and is instead governed by 10 principles: radical inclusion, gifting, decommodification, radical self-reliance, radical self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation and immediacy.
Translated: There is no Internet, no cell phone service, no advertisements and no corporate logos. (An interesting concept for me, the advertising-major-Internet-addict.) There are no cash transactions…everything you need is bartered for. There are, however, bicycles decorated with flowers and bells and sequins and lights. There are huge art installations that range from a 10 foot watch that symbolizes an evolutionary clock to a huge interactive encyclopedia to a bio-tanical garden that harvests human organs and body parts until they’re ready to be “trans-planted.” There are theme camps, psychedelic lights, overall chaos of the best type and for many festival-goers, there is “Burning Man Shock,” a state of happiness, euphoria and freedom which sets in while attending Burning Man, after one has conformed to ‘normal’ life for too long.
While the festival comes across as a week of complete hedonism, what intrigued me was the sense of community among “Burners” that remains intact for the rest of the year, even after the festival is over, the Man has been immolated, and the city has been dismantled. What used to be just a wild, anarchistic week in the desert has evolved into cultural movements, arts celebrations, humanitarian organizations and quite a few businesses. Groups like Burners Without Borders, Black Rock Solar, the Black Rock Arts Foundation and over sixty Regional groups in 7 different countries support and promote community-based interactive art and civic participation year round. These Burners are involved in projects like Hurricane Katrina cleanup, neighborhood beautification, teaching communities how to install low-cost renewable energy and awarding grants to non-traditional artists. Many Burners choose not to go back to the festival to devote more time and energy to instilling the Burning Man principles in their own everyday lives and communities.
Considering Burning Man’s mission is “to generate society that connects each individual to his or her creative powers, to participation in community, to the larger realm of civic life, and to the even greater world of nature that exists beyond society,” they seem to be doing something right. And if dancing around a fire wearing a sparkly orange tutu in the middle of the Nevada desert in August leads you to that state of mind…more power to you. (And where can I sign up?)
